Instant Immersion Spanish Reviewer's Comments

Instant Immersion Spanish Deluxe by TOPICS Entertainment combines powerful software technology with practical audio presentations. Instant Immersion uses nearly the same software as the Tell Me More program but also has intermediate and advanced learning levels, audio CDs and an interactive game included in the package.

Instant Immersion offers the same speech recognition capabilities as Tell Me More and the same teaching methods and activities. While Instant Immersion did not inherit the excellent online chat and testing options, they did try to increase the value of the product by including audio CD lessons, an interactive DVD and the Spanish game to offer extra learning methods. While the extra programs are useful they also make the learning environment cumbersome because you must switch back and forth between disks. Combine that with less-than-adequate support and Instant Immersion just doesn't have enough momentum to make it into our top 3.

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Features:  

Instant Immersion offers great features, with an excellent progress tracking system that allows you to see where you have done well and where you need improvement. Instant Immersion Spanish lessons can also be transfered to a PocketPC or MP3 player, making the program versatile because you can study Spanish almost anywhere.

Fundamentals:  

Instant Immersion covers all the basics of learning a language through several different workshops that focus on various activities. Some improve pronunciation through the use of a sophisticated speech recognition program. Some focus on grammar rules and vocabulary retention. And still others allow you to practice conversations with Spanish speakers. The curriculum integrates all of these exercises into the lessons, but you can visit each of the workshops individually.

Ease of Use:  

The interface of Instant Immersion can be a little confusing at first. When the mouse isn't hovering over an icon, the icon goes nearly transparent. This makes them hard to see, and in some situations we weren't even aware of some of the important features because the buttons were not easily visible. In other settings, the translucent icons make them look like certain options aren't available when they are. 

One of the problems with Instant Immersion is actually the wide range of features. Some are only accessible through hard to find menus, and using the interactive DVD, audio CDs and game can involve a lot of disk swapping.

Teaching Tools:  

Instant Immersion has plenty to offer Spanish students. You can begin learning with picture-word association, matching a Spanish word to a familiar picture. Related to this learning task is the word-match task, where you match an English word to a Spanish one. Another exercise includes placing a vocabulary word in context by filling in the blanks of a sentence. (If you need a hint during this exercise, you can move your mouse over the Spanish word to see the definition in English.)

You can play around some more with sentence word order by putting scrambled sentences back together. This exercise gives you some grammar practice, but you can expand your grammar skills by conjugating verbs. Instant Immersion has a section that will teach you all the Spanish language grammar and conjugation rules in a classroom-like setting. A convenient link button can jump you right to a grammar description of the particular sentence you are working on so you can see the grammar rules in context. Another useful feature is the conjugation section which allows you to look up all the ways you can conjugate a Spanish verb.

To help you master individual words, The Instant Immersion Glossary defines and pronounces each Spanish word for you. The built-in dictionary offers a unique search feature-just type in a word or the start of a word and the dictionary will give you the definition or a list of words to choose from.

The speech recognition software included with Instant Immersion Spanish Deluxe is excellent. The software accurately measures your voice and tells you which words you pronounce wrong. You can even adjust the judgment level for the speech recognition to be lenient or strict. Instant Immersion also has a 3D diagram of a mouth that shows exactly where to place your tongue when you pronounce a specific word or syllable.

Instant Immersion offers you several games entertaining exercises to practices these and other Spanish language skills, including dictation and transcription practice. The biggest game is  "Who is Oscar Lake?" It allows you to navigate an environment and interactive with native Spanish-speakers in order to solve a mystery. The game doesn't work well from time to time, but it can still be a useful practice tool for learning Spanish.

Word Tools:  

Instant Immersion Spanish Deluxe has several word resources available, including a translator tool and an extensive dictionary and grammar reference.

Help/Support:  

Instant Immersion has one of the weakest support systems of any program we reviewed. The FAQ is hidden behind a system that requires you to log questions. It is not very intuitive and even frustrating at points. The Instant Immersion website is alarmingly light on information about it's products, too. There is an email support option, but responses are not very prompt.

Summary:  

Even though Instant Immersion uses much of the same technology as our #1 product, it lacks some of the most helpful options and has inadequate customer support. It's definitely a good product but not the best for learning Spanish.