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What is the best way to learn Spanish? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| culebrilla Senior Member United States Joined 4002 days ago 246 posts - 436 votes  Speaks: Spanish | Message 9 of 19 24 December 2013 at 2:18am | IP Logged | ||
Good luck in your quest. 1. Have fun. Most important thing to keep you motivated and for you to study or practice. 2. After you feel comfortable, you could join a meetup.com group where there are Spanish clubs. If you live near a university you will probably have Spanish clubs where there are native speakers that lead the talks. 3. Your university may have resources to do face-to-face language exchanges. I did that through my university a few years ago. 4. When I was an A2 Spanish speaker I started to listen to Juanes (Colombian Spanish) and got hooked. I would write down the words I didn't understand in the lyrics book. I don't know if you would buy cds on amazon but I still buy physical ones. The only problem is that they seem to be getting rid of the lyrics in the casework. :( 5. You could get a book on amazon (I bought one and read like half of it) but really I think that you should just learn the slang when you meet up with native speakers. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1/179-7160539-7375350 ?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=spanish%20slang&spref ix=spanish+sl%2Caps&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3Aspanish%20slang 6. What type of slang and music are you interested in? Let me know the country and I could recommend some bands for you and write down the most "high-yield" slang for the countries I'm familiar with. Edit: I'm best at Mexican and Spanish slang in case you are interested in those. I could teach you good slang and gutter slang if you wish. :) Edited by culebrilla on 24 December 2013 at 2:28am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6602 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 10 of 19 24 December 2013 at 3:17am | IP Logged | ||
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There are quite a few Juanes songs at lyricstraining! Include those pending approval by using advanced search.
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| Indíritheach Senior Member United States Joined 4050 days ago 108 posts - 146 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Irish, French | Message 11 of 19 24 December 2013 at 12:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'd start off with Assimil Spanish with Ease. That's what I used as a "false beginner" to get my Spanish up to a good intermediate level. Like you, I studied Spanish in high school and college, and with the exception of one excellent 11th grade teacher, I learned very little. Assimil is great because it only takes about 30 minutes per day, and you can use the rest of your time to listen to music, watch TV shows, etc. You'll be spending about 5 months with Assimil, and I promise you in those 5 months you will make up for all of that "wasted time" in high school and college.
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| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6602 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 12 of 19 24 December 2013 at 1:12pm | IP Logged | ||
In the modern world, finding the materials in most languages is no problem, so you can be more selective. If you read about things that really interest you, you will be far more motivated. Of course if we're speaking about the extensive use of native materials, Destinos is the best option in the beginning. But especially for intensive reading, the best materials are the ones you'll actually read, whatever they are. In a similar vein, if any of your favourite celebrities are Spanish-speaking, you can watch short clips with them repeatedly :-) 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4673 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 13 of 19 24 December 2013 at 1:19pm | IP Logged | ||
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''What is the best way to learn Spanish?''
Listen and repeat. :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Stelle Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Canada tobefluent.com Joined 4149 days ago 949 posts - 1686 votes Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish Studies: Tagalog | Message 14 of 19 24 December 2013 at 2:00pm | IP Logged | ||
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I started learning Spanish in May 2013, and I'm very happy with my progress so far. My main tools as a beginner
were Destinos, Notes in Spanish podcasts, Skype tutors/language partners, songs, children's books and an accessible grammar workbook (Practice Makes Perfect). If I were starting over again, I'd use the exact same approach. I'm an impulsive procrastinator. If it isn't fun, then I probably won't do it. And 7 months later, this impulsive procrastinator is still happily putting in 2 hours of Spanish every day. I don't doubt that a step-by-step approach with specific programs (like the one suggested by James29) is ideal in many ways, but you have to figure out what works for you. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4914 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 15 of 19 29 December 2013 at 1:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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There has been a lot of advice, and we run the risk of drowning you in good ideas. I am going to add Duolingo to the mix. I wish it had existed when I started learning French. A lot of people have started Duolingo, and quit after a month. The problem is that it is addictive, and (judging by the points they got) they burnt out from doing it too much. I did the same thing, but have returned to it after about 6 months. Now I'm trying to limit myself to 15-20 minutes a day on Duolingo so I don't burn out again.
Duolingo will not teach you the language on its own (so please, nobody write an objection to it on these grounds). But it fits in nicely as a fun supplemental resource, to use alongside whatever else you choose to use to learn Spanish. Just FYI, if you complete the Spanish skill tree on Duolingo, you will have learned 1571 words (and word strength "decays" over time, so you have to keep them up... all part of the fun!) If you use Michel Thomas you learn about 500 words, and the same goes for Pimsleur. Assimil covers about 2500 words (but you don't necessarily learn them all). The reason MT and Pimsleur don't teach as much vocab is, (1) they have different focuses (verb use in MT, speaking in Pimsleur), and (2) they are all-audio courses, so there's just not the time to cover any more vocabulary. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| AML Senior Member United States Joined 6830 days ago 323 posts - 426 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: Modern Hebrew, German, Spanish | Message 16 of 19 01 January 2014 at 12:34am | IP Logged | ||
To the original poster (OP): keep in mind that this type of program COULD be *tremendously* boring for you. It depends on your style of learning languages. I would suggest trying many different approaches in the beginning to see what you enjoy. Lyrics Training, for example, is quite enjoyable. At the very least, if you follow the above type of program, throw in some more fun things each day (music, read Harry Potter, watch movies, etc) to keep your motivation up. EDIT: I second Destinos. It's great. Edited by AML on 01 January 2014 at 12:35am 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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