HeidiM
Norwegian textbook recommendations

Hi,

 

I'm learning Norwegian, but finding it hard to get my hands on a textbook. Have heard that 'På Vei' is good, though it's hard to come by in the UK and looks it'll cost a fair bit for me to buy from Norway. So before I part with cash, has anyone used På Vei and was it any good?

 

Does anyone have any other recommendations? 

 

Thanks in advance for any help! :)

Jan 5, 2014 6:04 PM
Comments · 11
4

I have both <På vei> and <Teach Yourself> too. The Norwegian language school I went used <På Vei>. It is crazy expensive, it costed me almost £100 to buy the book, excercise book and CDs.

 

It feels like a book specifically designed for new immigrants in Norway, and help the new-comers to cope with the language level test (required for work premit, family reunion or take further education...).  I have been learned English, and Spanish, comparing with the rich learning materials that I have come across in the past, I really can't say <På Vei> is a GREAT text book, but it's probably one of the best Norwegian text book that's available and widely used in Norway.

 

Well, it's a small country the language is not being particularly popular in the world, can't really complain too much the lack of good Norwegian learning recources. But the positive side is the Norwegian people are very friendly and helpful. It shouldn't be too difficult to find someone to help you to practise Norwegian. So whatever book you choose, it would be better to suppliment with lots self-study--listen to the radio(NRK net radio), read news articles (check websites like   http://www.aftenposten.no,  http://www.dagbladet.no, http://www.vg.no/) and talk with the native speakers, etc. 

 

Good luck!

 

 

 

January 8, 2014
3

I started with "Teach yourself" Series of norwegian and felt it was very very good. I have never seen Pa vei but am currently working through stein pa stein, and dont feel like I missed much skipping Pa vei. I do think the layout of stein pa stein and her pa berget (just got mine in the mail for starting on in a few weeks) is excellent in terms of theme organization. Pa vei may be similar and have some advantage, but Teach yourself is definitley a nice cheap way to start.

January 8, 2014
2

Hi Rafael,

 

Thanks for the advice, really helpful. I will check out the YouTube channels you mentioned, because they sound useful. I'd already subscribed to a couple of channels about Norway and Norwegian - Thirduncle1's Norwegian Language Channel and TheNorgeScone. They're pretty helpful, because they're both non-native speakers, so they're aware of the challenges non-natives face when learning the language.

 

You're right about literature being expensive and hard to come by. I might try using this site to get books: http://www.bokkilden.no They seem to ship to the UK, so if anyone else is interested they may ship to other countries too.

 

Aftenposten is proving useful. I'm trying to make time to read an article each day - firstly, just getting a feel for it with what vocab I have. Then I'll go through more thoroughly and translate whatever I need to get it to make sense. Helpful to learn like this as it generates new words for me to use and gives me the context. Just have to remember not to translate word for word, but to get an overall feel.

 

Lykke til!

January 11, 2014
1

Hi Heidi
I can see you're getting deep into bokmål (Norwegian) and I feel gladness of know I'm not the only one that learns by his own; I can recommend you "Ny i Norge", "Bo i Norge", "one minute of Norwegian", "Teach Yourself Norwegian", "Colloquial Norwegian", "På Vei" and a Dictionary English-Norwegian (In my case Spanish-Norwegian [because spanish is my mother tounge]) and besides it's really difficult to get any of that literature, you can go to this site: http://www.jw.org/en/publications and DISPLAY publications in Norwegian (that's such a big source of vocabulary and final: there are plenty channel on youtube: thenorwegianteacher, Learn Norwegian Naturally, NorwegianClasd, Learn Norwegian with NorwegianClass101.com, etc.

 

And the best of all is that you can get any of what I said on the internet, so you only need to google it a few more. 

 

Good luck (for both of us) and perhaps we can chat later!! :D

 

January 10, 2014
1

but if you want to push your luck; try Rosetta Stone :) :)

January 9, 2014
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