The other person from ottawa took the words right out of my mouth!

This is THE worst book that has ever been put into print. I do not know who's sick, SICK idea it was to force grade elvens to read this but I personally would pay-- I would pay not to have this book put into print and for the board of education to find an actual book like Catcher in the Rye or the stranger DO NOT come close to this book, if you can help it. If Amazon allowed it I would give this book negative ten hundred stars.

As a student of various Romance language, I purchased this book thinking it would allow me to learn Portuguese even more quicker, however, I was disappointed. The book uses mnemonics in order to help readers memorize words by using clever catch ryhmes, but instead of helping, it only confuses the student. I would pass on this series and any other books published by the University of Texas Press (e.g. "Simoes Com Licenca," etc..). Texas is a great place to learn Spanish, but if you really want to learn Portuguese, I highly recommend Georgetown University's "Travessia" series. It is an excellent book, audio, and video series that allows students to learn the language at an easy rate. Save your money and pass this book by!

I have studied 4 languages beside Portuguese and purchased this book thinking it might be useful. Actually, this book uses a vocab learning aproach that incoorperates the sound of portuguese words with English definitions of those words in English rhymes. For example, "early" ("cedo" in Portuguese) might be presented as "SAY DO you want to call Dave, and be EARLY for tomorrow's parade?" Anyone familiar with language aquistion knows the most effective way to learn vocabulary is to define words in terms of images or vocabulary already aquired in the language. The idea of remembering a Portuguese word using English rhymes is silly and inappropriate for anyone seeking lasting mastery of the language. A real disappointment.

Please note that this book is written in SPANISH

Presents Spanish vocabulary using English rhymes. For example (p. 18):

" deber(1) ought to

One day bears traversed this splendid wild. Some say we ought to leave it undefiled."

Bold letters in the text draw attention to "day" and "bear" in the first line, which approximate the Spanish verb "deber". Bold letters in the second line draw attention to "ought to", the English meaning of "deber".

Different people learn languages in different ways, and some might find this technique useful. I found much more laborious than it was worth.