Pimsleur(R) equals success. Just one 30-minute lesson a day gets you speaking and understanding like no other program. This course includes Lessons 1-16 from the Swahili Level 1 Program - 8 hours of audio-only effective language learning with real-life spoken practice sessions. Each lesson provides 30 minutes of spoken language practice, with an introductory conversation, and new vocabulary and structures. Detailed instructions enable you to understand and participate in the conversation. Practice for vocabulary introduced in previous lessons is included in each lesson. Topics include: greetings, numbers, meals, shopping, telling time, scheduling activities, and asking and giving directions. The emphasis is on pronunciation and comprehension, and on learning to speak Swahili. Reading instruction begins in Lesson 11 to provide you with an introduction to reading Swahili. A Reading Booklet PDF must be downloaded. The Swahili Language Swahili, or Kiswahili, the most widely-spoken African language, is a Bantu language spoken by approximately 5 million native-speakers living mainly along the East African coast from Somalia to the North Africa coastline of Madagascar. Up to an additional 150 million people speak Swahili as a second language. It is recognized as an official national language in Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania. Pimsleur's Swahili teaches Standard Swahili as spoken in and around Nairobi, Kenya. Written Swahili uses 24 letters from the Roman alphabet, excepting C, Q, and X, and including an additional letter "CH." Tech Talk - CDs are formatted for playing in all CD players, including car players, and users can copy files for use in iTunes or Windows Media Player.