Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
I'm not a fan of Pimsleur myself, their method of repeating the words backwards is ridiculous and unhelpful. :wacko: But I'd like to say that the Russian sentences Pimsleur uses are not " extremely unnatural". They are often awkward and sometimes very old-fashioned, but still understandable. It's not broken Russian, though they sound sometimes like something that a foreigner, who's very proficient, would say.
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Quote:
Originally Posted by gRomoZeka
But I'd like to say that the Russian sentences Pimsleur uses are not " extremely unnatural".
I meant that some sentences are. And in general, Russians don't speak the way they use in Pimsleur; and many Pimsleur situations are just strange, for example, "- My name is Elena. - Glad to meet you, Elena. Where would like to drink some vodka with me?"
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Оля
.. and many Pimsleur situations are just strange, ...
I agree, it sounds weird. Maybe this is an attempt at humour? ;) Anyway it seems like a common flaw of all the textbooks and courses. I've yet to find a book where dialogs are absolutely natural. Alas. :unknown:
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Finally something that I agree with DDT on. :wink:
Pimsleur is simply too big to ignore - even if (as Olya says) there are some problems with it.
Actually it's more material than I said earlier - more like 50 hours in total.
I have already done part 1 and part 2 --- Silly or not, I will finish the course as a matter of principle.
I agree that some of the situations are a bit silly / unrealistic - but despite that -- it's really the largest course out there.. And like DDT, I haven't exactly bankrupted myself to buy this course either - so I can't complain about something I haven't paid for.
The Pimsleur repetition ad-infinitum actually works for me... I am definitely no more talented at language learning than the average Pimsleur user.
I am SO grateful to the people (olly and others :rose: :good: :rose: somebody called "grogs" ) who worked on creating and correcting scripts for Pimsleur and put them on this site. I can't even explain how tremendously helpful that has been.
The big challengers to Pimsleur in the audio area are
1) The Michel Thomas course (the teacher is really good!) a British made course. Approx 6 hours, no book.
2) Assimil "La Russe sans peine" Supposedly VERY good - I haven't started it yet. However requires you to understand French to use the book. Approx 4 hours, plus a book.
I have tons of other material too... "EuroTalk", "Russisch bitte" and plenty more. Some is a bit dated, i.e. 1990s or earlier.... and some is rather dull...
:druzja: :druzja: :druzja: :druzja: :druzja: :druzja:
Is anyone interested in doing a rundown of what material you have and what you liked / didn't like.. ?
(We could start a separate thread for that? )
:druzja: :druzja: :druzja: :druzja: :druzja: :druzja:
Also: I don't mind sharing what I have assuming everybody tries to reciprocate...
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Thanks so much for this post. I am currently studying in Russia right now and am preparing(well, have been preparing for the last 6 months really) for this exam. The plan was to try to take level 2 before I go home but it seems based on the info here that I need to take level one first. And here I thought I could save some money ;)
Thanks again, especially for the PDFs. From the looks of it, aside from the speaking(it's slow going unfortunately) I could take level 2 and most likely pass. Darn my horrible stage fright!
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kennedy
Thanks so much for this post. I am currently studying in Russia right now and am preparing(well, have been preparing for the last 6 months really) for this exam. The plan was to try to take level 2 before I go home but it seems based on the info here that I need to take level one first. And here I thought I could save some money ;)
Thanks again, especially for the PDFs. From the looks of it, aside from the speaking(it's slow going unfortunately) I could take level 2 and most likely pass. Darn my horrible stage fright!
What materials are you using to study?
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Quote:
Originally Posted by fortheether
What materials are you using to study?
Specifically for the test? I already went though the full practice test for the first level - our teacher made us copies of it, and I just recently bought "тесты тесны тесты... II cертификационный уровень" which unfortunately is just for the grammar portion of the test which was why I was really relived to stumble upon this thread. There is also a book of verbs and words that one SHOULD know before taking the second level(they also have such books for each level)
But in addition to that:
Знаю и люблю русские глаголы
Shaum's outlines: Russian Grammar
Дорога в Россию 2
Русский язык - первые шаги(I did book 2, and am working on three at the moment)
Слово: пособие по лексике и разговорной практике
Let's Improve Our Russian!
and
изучаем русский язык, узнаем Россию(also working on that at the moment by myself)
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kennedy
Знаю и люблю русские глаголы
Как мило. :)
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Да. «Знаю» и «люблю» — русские глаголы.
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
First, let me introduce myself, my name is Tim and I live, well, I am between cities, despite my username. I have lived in Moscow and Kiev for three years or so...
Well- I came here looking for information on Russian films, and saw this post on the TORFL, which I happen to know a fair amount about.
You can download TORFL practice tests of every level here:
http://www.zlat.spb.ru/catalog5_12.html
I took level 2 around a year and a half ago, and am going for level three now; I used Living Language Russian Advanced (a bit of a misnomer, actually) to prepare for level 2, and it helped quite a bit.
At http://www.zlat.spb.ru in general you can find lots of useful materials.
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
Quote:
Originally Posted by tim_in_kiev
First, let me introduce myself, my name is Tim and I live, well, I am between cities, despite my username. I have lived in Moscow and Kiev for three years or so...
Well- I came here looking for information on Russian films, and saw this post on the TORFL, which I happen to know a fair amount about.
You can download TORFL practice tests of every level here:
http://www.zlat.spb.ru/catalog5_12.html
I took level 2 around a year and a half ago, and am going for level three now; I used Living Language Russian Advanced (a bit of a misnomer, actually) to prepare for level 2, and it helped quite a bit.
At
http://www.zlat.spb.ru in general you can find lots of useful materials.
Thank you Tim!
Scott
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
How do Russians pronounce TORFL and TRKI ?
Re: TORFL (Test of Russian as a Foreign Language)
I've never heard of such a test,anyway it's interesting. I don't wanna take it ,though,because although I speak fluent and without accent,I have some problems in writing Russian,therefore I'd better not.