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well i got this book with cds to help me learn danish so i could speak to my friend in her native languge.well she even said that the way they teach new people danish is crap. I dont understand what is going on I end up having to have her explain everything they are saying in the book so a waste of money.she is just teaching me online. i learn more just talking to her. the book is alittle help but not recomended for you if your just learning and never spoke or heard danish.
Overall this is a very good book: it explains the grammar clearly, it has many reading passages, accurate cultural information, and effective excercises.You can complete this package in around 6 months with daily studies.One of the things I especially liked was that the dialogues cover a very wide range of scenarios, from having dinner with people to going to see the doctor - so you build up a very practical vocabulary.It is essential that the beginner gets the cd's that accompany this book, because Danish, as well as Swedish and Norwegian, do not follow logical pronunciation patterns.For example, the Danish letter 'e' can be pronounced as: 'i' as in "fit", 'ur' as in "fur", 'ae' as in "fang", 'e' as in "bed", 'ew' as in "few", 'ai' as in "eye".even though the spelling is exactly the same in all cases.There is no specific rule that determines how it is pronounced in a given situation, it all depends on the word itself, so the pronunciation of a word containing 'e' has to be memorized accurately.
I have found this book and CD set to be very valuable for learning Danish. I only use it in my "spare time", and when I traveled to Denmark a second time, after only a few months of using this program off and on, I was amazed at what I could understand and read. I hope to see an advanced level course of this program very soon. (hint, hint)
Each themed unit contains 3 or 4 dialogues followed by relevant vocabulary and grammar points. There aren't many Danish language books available in English but this is the best that I've seen. It has a good balance of conversational Danish and theory, presented in units of a good length so that covering 1 per week is achievable. It does make a reasonable attempt to cover pronounciation despite some of the other comments on this website. You definitely need to use it with the CDs though.
I have only had this program for 2 weeks and I've learned a TON of danish, very well laid out, excellent audio quality, and I live in Denmark, and even my friends here are saying its quite well done. Its apparently a bit formal in the language, but far less so than any other language guide I've come across. Great book - the book is essential.
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