I'm considering making an investment in a high-end language program. For various reasons, studying Spanish in Spain is not an option for me. I've studied Spanish at various times in my life, and would really like to take my skills to the next level. I also really want to study Castilian since my work and travel takes me to Spain and not other parts of the Spanish-speaking world. Most generic language programs just teach "Spanish" which usually means Latin American Spanish.

It's worth it to me to do a good program, so I'm willing to spend some money. I'm considering the Rosetta Stone program. Any reviews? Any suggestions of other programs?

Mil gracias...

One of my colleagues at work has used the Rosetta Stone program for another language, and she raves about it. She looked at a lot of programs and believes this one is the best - at least for the language she was studying. I don't know how the Spanish programs compare, but there you go.

I've played around a bit with Michel Thomas's audio CDs for Italian and French. He has them for Spanish, too. I like his approach a lot. It's all listening and speaking - no reading or writing involved - so it depends on what's most important to you.

I like the Pimsleur program very much. My wife and I lived in Spain for a time and used the tapes there. We probably speak and understand Spanish at a high intermediate level and the Pimsleur tapes get most of the credit.

I did Micheal Thomas German CDs and they were crap, all he did was tape 8 hours a poorly run German class and that was it, didn't even bother correcting there pronoucation, the one student never got beyond the basics, so after 8 hours he was still doing the same thing. There are much better and cheaper language CDS out there.