Rosetta Stone in Schools
April 10, 2020

Rosetta Stone in Schools

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 1 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Rosetta Stone Language Learning Software

Rosetta Stone is used in my district for World Language classes for middle school and high school students. It offers a learning management platform and offers the capability of students choosing languages more than just what our teachers know and are qualified to teach.
  • Tracks user interaction
  • Customer service availability
  • Accessibility
  • My students get furiously angry with the poor quality of voice recognition.
  • The target language structures, scope and sequence of the program is not comprehensible. The program does not offer explanations for how to properly create phrases nor does the program accept varieties of an expression (so you have to be word for word rote in order to be granted credit). For example, the program would not accept equivalent phrases like "On Wednesdays I run" and "I run on Wednesdays" which would be OK in typical communication. Additionally, the program was initially deemed desirable because students could learn at their own pace, but I never really saw take away learning as a result of using Rosetta Stone but instead students were able to mimic sounds and click the "hint" button for answers to get through modules.
  • Students don't find the curriculum particularly engaging, which may not be as much a reflection on the product but rather how it is being used in it's application at my school.
  • It would be nice if it could run in some sort of "lockdown browser" capacity because I find students open various web tabs for music and google translate just to get through the program. They're more worried about completion than the practice toward learning...and the poor speech recognition will pick up utterances that aren't even close to the target phrase while often not accepting genuine attempts at the phrase, so there isn't a lot of fidelity from students to trying to use the program.
  • I do not know what expenses my district has incurred in using this program, but I know that generally user approval is not very high, and for that reason I feel that the use of the program has been very detrimental to our World Language program.
I have used Memrise, Busuu and Duolingo which are similar language learning programs. I would rank any of those above Rosetta Stone. I don't see much "value added" from paying to use Rosetta Stone, and my students get more enjoyment from the other mentioned programs. I believe that comprehensible input is the best approach to language learning which isn't accomplished with solely online instruction.
There is no real accountability to learning since users can click the "show answers" button through the entire program--although I wouldn't recommend getting rid of the "show answers" button either because coming up with the verbatim expressions the program demands would be nearly impossible without being fed the answers.

Do you think Rosetta Stone Language Learning Software delivers good value for the price?

No

Are you happy with Rosetta Stone Language Learning Software's feature set?

No

Did Rosetta Stone Language Learning Software live up to sales and marketing promises?

I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process

Did implementation of Rosetta Stone Language Learning Software go as expected?

I wasn't involved with the implementation phase

Would you buy Rosetta Stone Language Learning Software again?

No

I think that Rosetta Stone would be best suited for someone looking to refresh their language skills after already having learned the language at some point, but has not been a particularly fruitful initial experience to foreign language learning.