Rating: 
Summary: Fun to learn Spanish
Review: As a Spanish teacher I have used this book to teach Spanish to adults. For those with no prior Spanish it can be challenging, but with guidance it can be quite fun and interesting. I especially like its format, with each unit beginning with a short story that contains the lesson's vocabulary and grammatical forms. The story is followed by several pages of a variety of exercises that can be written in the book, and grammar explanations. Each unit is packed with new vocabulary, which takes the learner quite beyond travel phrase books. This is a nice, fat book that really gives the truly motivated a lot to learn. The monotony of typical practice books is broken up with fun illustrations and two colors of ink for the text. For anyone studying without a teacher, I'd recommend contacting the publisher for a teacher's manual in order to obtain the answers to the exercises and check your work.
Rating:
Summary: Fun to learn Spanish
Review: As a Spanish teacher I have used this book to teach Spanish to adults. For those with no prior Spanish it can be challenging, but with guidance it can be quite fun and interesting. I especially like its format, with each unit beginning with a short story that contains the lesson's vocabulary and grammatical forms. The story is followed by several pages of a variety of exercises that can be written in the book, and grammar explanations. Each unit is packed with new vocabulary, which takes the learner quite beyond travel phrase books. This is a nice, fat book that really gives the truly motivated a lot to learn. The monotony of typical practice books is broken up with fun illustrations and two colors of ink for the text. For anyone studying without a teacher, I'd recommend contacting the publisher for a teacher's manual in order to obtain the answers to the exercises and check your work.
Rating: 
Summary: A generally excellent textbook for beginners.
Review: I am a professional tutor of college-level Spanish and use this book with almost all my private beginning students (i.e., those not enrolled in a first-semester college course). They appreciate the book's low price, humor, useful vocabulary, clear grammar explanations, logical organization, extensive cultural information, and the textbook/workbook format: being able to write the answers to the exercises on the lines in the book. Working with this book and a good tutor, the diligent student can get a terrific combination of basic grammar plus considerable practice reading, writing, speaking, and listening, all while having a lot of fun. The book is marred by some typos, but I don't know any foreign-language textbook that isn't -- and I speak four languages. I simply correct the typos for my students as we go along. In sum, it's a very good book for the price.
Rating:
Summary: comprehensive and fun
Review: I am not a disciplined person and find it difficult to buckle down and study. With this book, I found myself studying and completing the lessons on my own on a regular basis. The lessons are entertaining and fun too!
Rating:
Summary: spanish now!
Review: I am using this book for a first time teaching adults and I thought I had found the perfect book. Now, I seem a little bit agitated and wish I had used Arriba! like the other college-level classes do.It is not a bad book, but I don't believe it is geared for someone who is trying to learn spanish without an instructor. I have studied tons of languages and usually lack the discipline to get started on most languages without an instructor. (I did manage to teach myself basic braille and elementary latin.) If you buy this book by yourself, you should also get the tapes and the teacher's manual. I would also highly recommend that even if you have an instructor that you should buy the tapes... I found that it also helps students if one teaches a review of english grammar before digging into spanish grammar. I wish more of our language books, including this one, carried a basic english grammar review. The book does have typos here and there (I am a book collector and most books do), and the tapes do not exactly match up with the units, but a well-prepared instructor and student can easily acknowledge and help correct this.
Rating:
Summary: Can't do it alone
Review: I am using this book for a first time teaching adults and I thought I had found the perfect book. Now, I seem a little bit agitated and wish I had used Arriba! like the other college-level classes do. It is not a bad book, but I don't believe it is geared for someone who is trying to learn spanish without an instructor. I have studied tons of languages and usually lack the discipline to get started on most languages without an instructor. (I did manage to teach myself basic braille and elementary latin.) If you buy this book by yourself, you should also get the tapes and the teacher's manual. I would also highly recommend that even if you have an instructor that you should buy the tapes... I found that it also helps students if one teaches a review of english grammar before digging into spanish grammar. I wish more of our language books, including this one, carried a basic english grammar review. The book does have typos here and there (I am a book collector and most books do), and the tapes do not exactly match up with the units, but a well-prepared instructor and student can easily acknowledge and help correct this.
Rating:
Summary: Spanish Now Will Keep You Motivated
Review: I have been trying to learn Spanish for a few years now.
I have tried it all. Including dating my Spanish instructor.
I believe that my biggest problem has always been trying to find the time to stay consistent with my studies. And when you cannot find the time to study, you don't make any progress. And when you're not making progress, you quickly lose interest.
I bought both level one and level two of Spanish Now to help me with my Spanish. I am also trying the Learning Spanish Like Crazy recorded lessons and I have been listening in to the Learning Spanish Like Crazy live tele-classses for several weeks now.
Unlike some of the other resources for learning Spanish,
Spanish Now offers exercises that really help you learn. By doing the exercises in Spanish Now and doing the Learning Spanish Like Crazy lessons, I am able to stay motivated even when I cannot find the time to study.
Rating:
Summary: Overall good value for the price!
Review: I have recently chosen this text for my 7th and 8th grade students of Spanish because of its concise treatment of grammar and many opportunities for written expression. However, my main reason for chosing this text was for its humorous approach to learning the language and many oral exercises included. It is my belief that to learn a foreign language, a student must constantly be exposed to oral stimuli, which this book does well. I did not give it a five-star rating simply because it can be a bit disorganized and hard to follow. However, the benefits outweigh the drawbacks.
Rating: 
Summary: Get the book! This product was misleading.
Review: I really thought this product would compliment the Spanish Now!: Level 1 textbook. But it didn't. I really wanted it for the listening comprehension exercises past section 3, but this product didn't even do that. It's basically just a narration of the stories contained in the first part of the book. If you really just need to hear the pronounciation, then I guess this is okay, but it's not really necessary at all if you'd already got the book and know how to correctly say the alphabet. Thumbs down. Not because the product itself is flawed, rather that it appears to be a compliment to the textbook when in reality it's totally, 100%, unnecessary. Spanish Now!: Level 1 textbook is pretty darn good though!
Rating:
Summary: comprehensive and fun
Review: I've tried to learn Spanish about three times and so have three books. I think this is the one to get me over the edge. It's very clear and fun.
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