Hugo Language Course: Norwegian In Three Months

By Oivind Blom

Book Overview

Now learning a foreign language can be enjoyable as well as challenging, and not require a trip back to the classroom. Available in both book-only or book-and-cassette format, these Three-Month... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0789444283
• ISBN13: 9780789444288
• Release Date: June 1999
• Publisher: Dk Pub
• Length: 231 Pages
• Weight: 0.68 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.8" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

Too bad Hugo dropped this series...

Unfortunately, this book is out of print at the moment. Hugo is republishing some of the "In Three Months" series (I see that Spanish and French will be re-released soon), but who knows if they will ruin the books by watering them down... I have worked through several Norwegian course books. Teach Yourself has been my favorite, followed by Beginner's Norwegian. But, I REALLY wish I had found this Hugo text first. It's the only book with which I am completely happy with the presentation of the material. This book is extremely logical in its layout and presentation. It is so refreshing to have vocabulary laid out in lists, have grammar concepts presented in their entirety rather than having it split up and sprinkled throughout the book, and have a non-lopsided teaching method. This is also the only Norwegian book that has sufficient exercises to cement the concepts into your head. It's not perfect, but really, I just can't say enough about how much I like the way this book teaches the language. Of course, there will be those who write it off as "old school." But if "old school" works, why should it be replaced, rather than just supplemented with the new technology and techniques? I think that's exactly what this book does. It has an audio component and is fairly user friendly. Yet it doesn't treat you like you have a learning disability. It doesn't present grammar and concepts in a contorted and watered-down fashion like most "new school" materials do. It's so refreshing to see this book telling you why a certain word is used in a certain situation rather than just having three versions of the same word introduced and never explained. For instance, the English word "by" translates to several words and uses in Norwegian. This Hugo book is on top of it--it tells you which to use and why you are using it. Other courses, on the other hand, introduce the several versions of the word and never satisfactorily explain which is used where. Another thing I did not like about Teach Yourself is the way it presented three or four versions of the same verb in three or four different places. For instance: hete, heter, hette, har hett... all tenses of the same verb (to be called or named). In Teach Yourself, these are scattered throughout the book as different words and the connection presented, but is not emphasized in the vocabulary like it should be. The grammar and vocabulary seem detached. In Hugo, the infinitive (the root tense) is presented as vocabulary (å hete), and you are taught to do your own conjugations--far more efficient! You learn it once and get the other three tenses at the same time. This means one vocab word to learn rather than four. Those relationships really streamline the learning process. Anyway, I'd say if you just want to dabble in the language (and there is nothing wrong with that--I dabble in several languages!), this book would be a bit much. But, if you really want to dig in and learn the language, AND you want to understand HOW

What a great deal

I spent about 1 hour per day for three months and started from scractch ven though my mother is norwegian. But even my norwegian relatives were impressed with my pronunciation. Be aware that there are several dialects (not to mention the two competing versions of Norsk: Bokmaal and Nynorsk), but the tapes provided give you a sense of two of the major ones. By the way, contrary to the other review, "uff da!" is considered by many Norwegians to be a Swedish phrase; when a tourist next to me said that phrase he received many looks of sad embarrasment. This book makes learning Norsk fun; the exercises make you think, but not too hard. The course has an excellent overall design.

Jeg Elsket Norsk I Tre Maneder!

Hugo's "In Three Months" series is by far the best and fastest way to learn a language. After buying this book, I understood and spoke norwegian in a snap. I was amazed at how quick I learned to speak it. Buy this book if you want to say more than "Uff Da"...............FAST!!!!