Auralog also straddles the divide between CD-ROM software and the online experience with its Tell Me More software. The program (see demo) takes over your entire screen, helping you to avoid distractions and get into the flow of the program. Each spoken prompt is followed by three choices, and you answer using a microphone. That's when the voice recognition kicks in, and your virtual conversation partner comes back with an appropriate response. These "dialogues" are followed by various guided activities, including the ability to practice your pronunciation using visual representations of the sound waves. It's mildly addictive -- and beneficial for your accent -- to try to max out your score at imitating a spoken utterance. Prices for CD-ROMs start at $235; the online service costs $9.95/day, $24.95/week, $49.95/month, $175/six months, and $295/year. Requires a PC with Internet Explorer.

Fluenz employs subtitled dialogues between an exemplary student and teacher.
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Fluenz

Currently for Spanish, French, and Chinese only, Fluenz offers DVD-ROM software for either Mac or PC, plus a CD-ROM included for headset listening on the go. Following a classroom-style, instructor-led approach, the program provides an introductory discussion in English; subtitled dialogues between the exemplary student and the teacher; reading, writing, and listening drills; and the ability for you to record yourself speaking one side of the dialogue or the other. ($218 for Level 1 Spanish/French; $248 for Level 2 Spanish/French; and $338 for the Mandarin bundle, add $100 for Mandarin on Windows Mobile, version 2 coming soon).

If the prices of the commercial offerings give you pause, you can find plenty of other online choices if you're willing to do some looking around. A good place to start is LangSource, run by the National Foreign Language Center (NFLC). Using the "Language Resource Search," pick from among 12 difficult languages and search for Electronic Sources to find free sites for learning Korean, Chinese, Tamil, and more. And if you become fluent (with a security clearance) in any of these, you can work as a contract linguist for the United States government through the NFLC.

Listen And Learn

If you're trying to learn a language while commuting or working out, the audio-only approach beats trying to operate a Web page while dodging traffic or riding the exercise bike. If you've figured out how to purchase songs from the iTunes Store or rip a CD onto your MP3 player, you can have an entire catalog of audio-only language-learning materials at your disposal. Also, with about 100 free language-learning podcasts available through iTunes, you can pick up anything from a phrase-of-the-day to the lesson-of-the-week across several languages. And it works! Last fall, I started listening to Coffee Break Spanish -- currently the #1 language podcast on iTunes, and it served me well during a trip to Barcelona in January. Generally, as with Coffee Break Spanish, the podcasts are free but the transcripts are available by subscription.

Another noteworthy source of audio content is Audible, which carries the Pimsleurcourses. Known for immersing learners in conversation without explicit grammar or drills, the Pimsleur approach has you listen to a single 30-minute lesson each and every day. If you stick with it, you can barrel through 90 lessons of Spanish in three months. Normally, it costs $274 for 30 lessons, but on Audible, you can buy five lessons at a time -- $29.16 for the intro, and $40.79 for subsequent lessons -- for a total of $233.11 for the first 30 lessons. Or, you can buy the AudibleListener Platinum plan to receive 24 credits all at once for $229.50, and then use 18 for a full set of 30 lessons, with credits left over for six additional audiobooks from the rest of the catalog.

If your idea of a language lesson involves sitting back and letting the sound wash over you, make it a point to try the earworms "Musical Brain Trainer" Rapid Languages series. The idea is deceptively simple. Like it or not, you probably know the lyrics to every stupid song you've ever heard. Why not, then, enlist the mental processes involved with committing words like "umbrella" to memory into the service of learning a foreign language? Each offering in the Earworms series includes numerous exchanges between an English speaker and a foreign-language speaker set against a background of varying New Age-style musical tracks with hypnotic, repetitive rhythms ($16.95 on Apple Store, also available on Audible, and coming soon to a retailer near you).