Pimsleur includes 30, 30-minute audio lessons and reading instruction as streaming or audio download, plus an integrated Reading Booklet.
The Easiest and Fastest Way to Learn Portuguese
Whether you want to travel, communicate with friends or colleagues, reconnect with family, or just understand more of what’s going on in the world around you, learning Brazilian Portuguese will expand your horizons and immeasurably enrich your life.
The best part is that it doesn’t have to be difficult or take years to master. Thirty minutes a day is all it takes, and we get you speaking right from the first day. Pimsleur courses use a scientifically-proven method that puts you in control of your learning. If you’ve tried other language learning methods but found they simply didn’t stick, then you owe it to yourself to give Pimsleur a try.
Pimsleur Makes Learning Easy
• 30-minute core lessons you can take anywhere, or do at home with Amazon® Alexa®
• Sync progress across devices
• Stream lessons or download to use in offline mode
• Share course with up to 3 additional household members
• Car mode for easy driving and learning
• Compatible with Amazon® Echo® devices for doing lessons at home
Why Pimsleur?
• Quick + Easy – Only 30 minutes a day.
• Portable + Flexible – Core lessons can be done anytime, anywhere, and easily fit into your busy life.
• Proven Method – Works when other methods fail.
• Self-Paced – Go fast or go slow – it’s up to you.
• Based in Science – Developed using proven research on memory and learning.
• Cost-effective – Less expensive than classes or immersion, and features all native speakers.
• Genius – Triggers your brain’s natural aptitude to learn.
• Works for everyone – Recommended for ages 13 and above.
What’s Included?
• 30, 30-minute audio lessons
• 60 minutes of reading instruction to provide you with practice reading Brazilian Portuguese
• In total, 16 hours of audio, all featuring native speakers
• A digital Reading Booklet
What You’ll Learn
Builds upon skills taught in Pimsleur’s Brazilian Portuguese Levels 1-3. You’ll be speaking and understanding Portuguese with near-fluency and with a broad range of conversational skills. In Level 4, the pace and conversation move more rapidly, accelerating exposure to new vocabulary and structures, and approaching native speed and comprehension.
Take a tour of Brazil with native speakers! A few of the topics included in Brazilian Portuguese Level 4:
• Traveling and sight-seeing: touring UNESCO Heritage Sites; exploring famous Brazilian landmarks; discussing architecture, the inauguration of cities and sites, and their architects; seeing spectacles of nature.
• Shopping: purchasing items to brighten up your work space; handicrafts; biojewelry; souvenirs.
• Foreign influences: the impact of immigrants upon the culture, architecture, and lifestyle of Brazil: Ukrainian, Dutch, African, German, Italian influences.
• Environment: respecting wildlife and the vegetation; protecting the environment; fighting pollution.
• Weather: discussing the temperature; speaking about rain, snow, heat; and protecting oneself from sunburn.
• Accommodations: making reservations and discussing being lodged at bungalows, bed and breakfasts, or hotels.
• Activities: biking; hiking on island trails; strolling on the cobblestone streets of Olinda; watching the sunset; walking one’s dog; riding a buggy on the Dunes of Marapé; drawing; taking nature photos; taking a cruise or canoe ride; camping in the Pantanal; going on a safari; watching soap operas; attending soccer matches; what one does to relax.
• Vacationing: discussing lodging; making plans during the rainy or dry seasons; choosing how many days to do something for; exploring the jungle; going to art galleries and poetry soirees.
• Family: talking about relatives and their jobs or marital status; discussing uncles, nephews and nieces, cousins, and grandparents; family sizes and habits.
• Wildlife and pets: talking about everything from cats and dogs to alligators, giant river otters, and the famous tuiuiús.
• Recipes / Food: ordering or trying Brazilian dishes; discussing preparation and ingredients; expressing likes and preferences; exploring regional specialties; tasting and describing qualities of drink and food; talking about allergies and foods that you adore or detest.
• More advanced grammar: talking about things in the past and the future; discussing things one would do or places one would live; using double negatives; hoping and daydreaming; saying what one would have done; and dropping pronouns.
After Lesson 30, an original short story, broken down into 20 manageable segments (over one hour), is provided for practice reading Brazilian Portuguese.
Learning the sound of each letter alone and in culturally distinct combinations allows your brain to process what you’re hearing in the audio lessons from a new and different perspective. It’s a powerful combination that makes Pimsleur different from every other method on the market.
The Pimsleur Method
We make no secret of what makes this powerful method work so well. Paul Pimsleur spent his career researching and perfecting the precise elements anyone can use to learn a language quickly and easily. Here are a few of his “secrets”:
The Principle of Anticipation
In the nanosecond between a cue and your response, your brain has to work to come up with the right word. Having to do this boosts retention, and cements the word in your mind.
Core Vocabulary
Words, phrases, and sentences are selected for their usefulness in everyday conversation. We don’t overwhelm you with too much, but steadily increase your ability with every lesson.
Graduated Interval Recall
Reminders of new words and structures come up at the exact interval for maximum retention and storage into your long-term memory.
Organic Learning
You work on multiple aspects of the language simultaneously. We integrate grammar, vocabulary, rhythm, melody, and intonation into every lesson, which allows you to experience the language as a living, expressive form of human culture.
Learning in Context
Research has shown that learning new words in context dramatically accelerates your ability to remember. Every scene in every Pimsleur lesson is set inside a conversation between two people. There are no drills, and no memorization necessary for success.
Active Participation
The Pimsleur Method + active learner participation = success. This method works with every language and every learner who follows it. You gain the power to recall and use what you know, and to add new words easily, exactly as you do in English.
The Brazilian Portuguese Language
Portuguese is the mother tongue of about 230 million people, mainly in Portugal and the Portuguese islands in the Atlantic, Brazil, and Portugal’s former overseas provinces in Africa and Asia. Pimsleur’s Brazilian Portuguese teaches the São Paulo metropolitan dialect.
Tech Talk
• Audio lessons can be streamed or downloaded for offline use in the Pimsleur App for iPhone®, iPad®, and most Android™ devices.
• Audio lessons can also be played on Amazon® Echo® devices using the Alexa® Pimsleur Skill.
• A desktop version is available for Mac® or Windows® computers.
• All purchased courses are backed up in your Pimsleur.com cloud-based digital library account.
• Pimsleur is designed for use by one registered user, plus up to three household members, and may be installed on unlimited devices for your personal use.
