"są" is used when it's plural - Polish Language question.

Cześć.
I am learning Polish from Rosetta Stone. I'm not very far and already having some grammar questions. I would appreciate any help anyone can give.

Here is goes:
There is a pic with 6 chairs. I have to pick "jest" or "są". So the correct answer in full is this, " Tu jest sześć krzeseł."

Now, another pic is of 2 beds. I pick "są" to get the right answer. Here it is: " Tu są dwa łożka."

Why? I was assuming that "są" is used when it's plural.
I would appreciate any guidance here.

Dziękuje Bardzo

Tony

Have you covered the cases of nouns in your course yet?

Cześć, Tony!

Ahemm, hate to be a pain, but Rosetta Stone (beyond maybe the most elementary conversation stuff) I found to be a waste of my time, speaking personally:-) Counting quirks in Polish are legion: Let's take an everyday masculine, inanimate noun "stół" (table)

There is one table. = JEST jeden stół.
There are two - four tables. = SĄ dwa - cztery stoły.

So far so good. After 'five' (5) in Polish, as well with most qualifiers "kilka" (some), "duży" (much/many), "wiele" (much/many) "niektóry" (various) etc., things start to get more than a little hairyLOL Don't know either how far you've gotten with cases, but after the previous qualifiers, often the genitive or possessive case instead of the nominative is used. To complicate things even further, numbers may well differ depending upon whether the the given noun is one of three genders masculine, feminine, neuter OR, animate virile vs. inanimate virile and non-virile:-0

Rosetta scarcely addresses most quirks in Polish (of which there seem countless) adequately in my view.

Rosetta Stone really is a waste of time and money.

But....

Michel Thomas is THE BEST!!
Its called the "Michel Thomas Method" because Michel is sadly dead.
Its a CD pack and its great! I learnt a lot from them :)

I haven't covered cases of nouns. Rosetta Stone uses a "figure it out" way of teaching. I have been using polish to english translation pages to help do some explaining that I believe that Rosetta Stone should be explaining.

Wlodzimierz, I now have reservations about continuing, my goal of speaking Polish seems unattainable now. But, I did make a commitment and will go on as long as I can. Does anyone have any suggestions on another program that is better than Rosetta Stone?

It's sad that you feel like that. I've also heard some fairly negative things about Rosetta Stone and the fact that you are so discouraged kind of confirms them. I'd personally steer clear of anything (like Rosetta Stone) that promises some kind of "quick fix". If these methods worked they'd be much more widely adopted by language teachers. I've been learning Polish for over three years and have lived in Poland for one

but I'm still a long way from being fluent. It's a hard language for an English speaker and takes a lot of hard work. Nevertheless, the language is really a thing of great beauty

and the sense of reward you will feel when you get something right will make all your effort worthwhile. And will get there. Everyone has the ability to learn languages. The only way to fail is to give up.

As far as recommending a program is concerned - I've heard good things about an introductory book called "Polish in Four Weeks." A more comprehensive course it "Hurra po polsku" which however is all in Polish so might not work for you if you don't have a teacher.

I can sing the polish national anthem, and probably can't do that right, and that's it.....

at least I try...

Thanks for the advice everyone. Taylor, I already downloaded Michel Thomas, I absolutely LOVE it. First CD is already answering my, "Why?". It starts from CD 1 with explanations. I can't thank you enough. I think my game plan is going to change to finishing all 8 of Thomas' CD's, then I will continue the Rosetta Stone. I will also look into the Hurra Po Polsku.(Dzięki Ziutek) I think my problem was having sole faith in Rosetta Stone alone. For any future readers having difficulties with Rosetta Stone, get the Michel Thomas CD's, it'll take you down a new and improved avenue.

Again to you all,
Dziękuje Bardzo

Tony

This is a very good book for beginners which will give you a good grounding in the language. There's a follow up book to it as well.

Can't comment on Rosetta Stone, but this book worked for me.
Don't be put off by people saying it's too difficult to learn, it is hard at times, but if you're really interested in learning, you'll do it.

Good luck.

Guys, the main problem with all these "methods", Pimsleur, Thomas, Rosetta, Berlitz ad infinitum, is that they only teach how to memorize the bare-bone basics of the language (even the advanced sections), rather than learning to THINK in the language. For Polish, native-accented voices notwithstanding, had I zero knowledge prior to using Rosetta Stone, I'd come out knowing only how to recognize certain structure/vocab in context, yet hardly what I'd need to function at effortless professional competence in the language!

The principal flaw with each of the above is that it is assumed that the learner doesn't want or for that matter, really need to learn Polish, German, French etc. like a native, since (mistakenly thought!!!!) the latter's knowledge of English is and always has been far superior to our knowledge of their language, i.e. we ought to just "give it a rest" as they say, and merely content ourselves with rote memorization etc..

Of course, nothing could be further from the truth:-)

The truth is that upscale Europeans think their English is so superior that they don't even need an advanced knowledge of it, as natives (as well as most foreigners) don't know higher-level English anyhow, so what's the differenceLOL

My recommendation to anyone out there is to pursue Polish with the same vengeance as I did. In the end, you'll win the respect of your business partner.