dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5024 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 97 of 271 22 January 2012 at 9:29pm | IP Logged |
I would like to share a positive progress story.
I saw my Spanish teacher for the first time in ages on Friday, and instead of spending much time studying grammar etc, we spent nearly the entire 2 hours talking about all manner of subjects. 85%-90% of this was in Spanish!
At one point he complemented me on how good my Spanish was and said he only had to make very minor corrections. Obviously, I was over the moon to hear this!
Thats not to say that I didnt hit brick walls, but I was able to overcome them with a bit of uming and ahing.
Once I became comfortable talking, I surprised myself many times with how much I was able to say. None of this was particulary eloquent, but at least I can get my point across on a variety of subjects, which is a good start.
I really feel that with enough practice actually speaking it wont be too long until I am able to say "I speak Spanish".
The best bit was we had to use future and conditional tenses extensively as I was talking about what I would like to do in the upcoming year, and I havent really studied thesse tenses much.
I think I have built a strong enough foundation to start properly tackling the subjunctive. Im ready to hit my studies with renewed enthusiasm as it seems the hard work is starting to pay off.!!
Edited by dbag on 22 January 2012 at 11:04pm
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James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French
| Message 98 of 271 23 January 2012 at 1:28am | IP Logged |
Congratulations. Your hard work really pays off. Seeing people you have not seen in a while is a great way to learn if you are really progressing.
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dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5024 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 99 of 271 25 January 2012 at 10:54am | IP Logged |
Thank you!
I have some more good news. I have just handed in my months notice at work, and am going to fly out to the south of Spain in mid - March. I will be traveling cheaply, and trying to stay there for as long as I can!
I will write more about this later, right now Im just riding the buzz of knowing that this is actually happening!
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James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5377 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French
| Message 100 of 271 26 January 2012 at 1:46am | IP Logged |
Wow! Congratulations. What part of Spain? Are you going to be able to be there for Carnival?
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Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5785 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German
| Message 101 of 271 26 January 2012 at 2:51am | IP Logged |
¡Qué envidia!
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July Diglot Senior Member Spain Joined 5275 days ago 113 posts - 208 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishB2 Studies: French
| Message 102 of 271 26 January 2012 at 1:23pm | IP Logged |
Welcome to Spain! You're going to love having access to the language 24/7. Where are you
planning to visit?
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dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5024 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 103 of 271 29 January 2012 at 2:47pm | IP Logged |
I am going to Seville first, and then work out the rest from there. I understand that its quite expensive there though, so I dont how long I will stay before moving on.
Ive decided to just buy a cheap one way ticket, and not to over analyse things too much.
Ive only ever spent a week at a time in Spain, so Im not too sure how long my money will last, but I reckon Il be spending most of my time in cheap dorm rooms. I reckon Ill have enough for at least a couple of months, and Il be exploring work options while Im there. This is a bit of a reccy for me really, I like the idea of living in Spain and think it would be quite easy to make happen, so I want to check out a few different areas of the country.
I have quite a bit of money saved in another account (most of which I recieved after the organisation I used to work for went bust) which is earmarked for travel further afield, hopefully later in the year. Probably either South America or South East Asia, but Il decide on that later.
I think going to Spain will just help me get out of the rut I am in at the moment, and of course I will be able to practice Spanish 24/7.
Edited by dbag on 05 February 2012 at 11:18pm
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dbag Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5024 days ago 605 posts - 1046 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 104 of 271 05 February 2012 at 11:58pm | IP Logged |
I have picked up the pace with Platiquemos again this week. Finished 27 and 28, then decided to skip 29 as I had had enough of the imperative (lthough I did have a quick skim through the basic sentences and the replacement and variation drills). I spent an hour with my tutour going through the differences between the informal and formal command as well, and wonder whether this is something best picked up in context?
I have been told that in Spain I will hardly ever need to use the formal command, although that is the form that pops into my head first everytime.
I was eager to get onto unit 30, which is a revision of all the previous material. I found it to be a breeze, which was something of a relief. Having said that, I have left the response drill on clitics to later as that looks like it will require a bit more concentration.
I doubt the wisdom of my decision to revise the first half of the course before moving on to unit 30. Well, some revision was definetly needed, but I have spent way too long at it and I dont think it has been of too much extra benefit.
Fortunately, level 5 looks really easy, more of an expansion unit. By which I mean you spend time drilling things which you should probably already know, but arent grammatically essential, such as times, dates and colours.
Im practically already done with unit 31 which is about how to construct sentences using the past progressive tense. I will go over the whole unit maybe once more tomorrow and then move on, in an attempt to get level 5 under my belt as quickly as possible. After that it'l be on to the subjunctive, which I am really looking forward to. There are a lot of things you cant express without a good knowledge of the subjunctive, and I want to get a bit of a handle on it before I get to Spain.
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