I've heard a few people mention them, but they're not particularly common. To describe the, you get a small book of about 100 or so small dialogues which start easy and gradually get more complicated, but instead of the vocabulary and grammar points being listed individually, the dialogue is translated on the next page into the source language (English), and then under the translation into proper English, English is written in the word order of the target language, so you understand what each part of the original sentence does, for example.
"Wait a minute! I think it's raining"
wait a moment! seem fall rain le!
Deng yi-xia! Haoxiang xia-yu le!"
More complex grammatical points are formerly listed, but for the most part you are expect to learn the grammar and vocabulary points by this method of breaking it down into the native word order, but using English.
Can you imagine this working, or does it seem a gimmick?
"Wait a minute! I think it's raining"
wait a moment! seem fall rain le!
Deng yi-xia! Haoxiang xia-yu le!"
More complex grammatical points are formerly listed, but for the most part you are expect to learn the grammar and vocabulary points by this method of breaking it down into the native word order, but using English.
Can you imagine this working, or does it seem a gimmick?