Illathanyou

I've been working on learning written Spanish for maybe a year or two now and I'm having trouble getting down spoken Spanish. What I am able to do well is only read Spanish, but not write, speak, or hear it.

I try to watch a lot of Spanish shows, but I just can't seem to pick out even Spanish words. It just all seems so extremely fast to me and I try to shy away from using subtitles since I feel that I'm not helping myself any if I do.

I don't really know anyone who speaks Spanish to practice with, so I'm kind of in the dark on how to best learn it. Any ideas for me??

gernt

You don't say where you are. I might have more suggestions if I knew your location, age, and situation. I'm in Tennessee, and there are plenty of people here who speak Spanish as a first language if not their only language. You are exactly right. You need someone to converse with one on one. Is there a local community college? You can often trade a half hour of English for a half hour of Spanish with a student. I attend a church service in Spanish, and I sometimes pay a tutor. Depending on your situation, you might be able to go to Mexico to study for a week or two. I did that two years ago. The whole thing, flight, school, lodging, meals, even gifts came in under $1000 and was tax deductible. The same school offers online conversation at $20 an hour. Schools much closer to me tend to actually be more expensive.

Destinos is a telenovela on 12 DVDs that is probably paced for around third year students. It is expensive, but used versions can be bought on Amazon.com. All you need are the DVDs. The other material adds to the cost, but the DVDs have subtitles and that suffices. It is way easier than regular television, especially since you can pause and back up.

Wolfgang

When I decided to learn French, I decided I wasn't interested in learning how to read or write it. I guess I employed the immersion method. In those days I was traveling to French speaking countries and was FORCED to use the language. It worked for me. You might try that if you can.

But what you're doing is right. Listening to shows is an excellent way to learn. But there are no shortcuts. You must force yourself to go through period of darkness where nothing seems to make any sense. If you hang in there long enough, I promise you patterns will begin to make themselves apparent to you and you'll start to develop confidence in the language.

At any rate, the real language is the spoken language. Luckily, Spanish more than most languages has a very high correspondence between the written and the spoken word. Hang in there . It's hard but it's worth it!

PS There's nothing wrong with using subtitles in the beginning as long as you connect what you read and what you hear in your head.

Illathanyou

Could you explain what you mean by trading a half hour of english for a half hour of spanish gernt? I'm trying to see if you meant to go about doing this through the school or just through other channels.


Thanks for your answer as well wolfgang! I do believe watching the shows is helping some because I'm noticing that they still talk fast, but when I'm able to actually pick out words, the speed of the speech feels like it slows for juusst a second.

Also, is it okay to only be able to connect what is spoken to written spanish words, but not be able to immediatly translate what is spoken to English?

Because when I use the subtitles, I find myself trying to focus more on what the written forms of the words spoken are rather than what the words are when translated to English.

Wolfgang

What I do when I watch French films is I concentrate on the spoken word, but I still read the titles just to see what they're talking about. It's a crutch and it takes practice but it helps in the learning process. I've learned enough French that way to have normal conversations. Learning a language it's hard and there are no shortcuts. I hope you stick with it .

__________________
I'm available for English->Spanish or Spanish->English translations.

exxcéntrica

Have you thought of joining voice chats?

__________________
“Los hombres son superiores a las mujeres porque Alá les otorgó la primacia sobre ellas. Portanto, dió a los varones el doble de lo que dió a las mujeres. Los maridos que sufrieran desobediencia de sus mujeres pueden castigarlas: abandonarlas en sus lechos, e incluso golpearlas.
No se legó al hombre mayor calamidad que la mujer."

El Corán (libro sagrado de los musulmanes, recitado por Alá a Maomé en el siglo VI)

Illathanyou

I'd really like to do that in person if I could. I tried it online and it just really didn't work out for me.

gernt

Sorry for the delay - I was in Cozumel, and I did practice and learn a bit. An intercambio is where someone who speaks little English talks with someone who speaks little Spanish for around an hour. You try to balance it out so each gets to practice. Sometimes an ad for doing that can be posted on the bulletin in a local community college - in Spanish, of course. One real quick way to make connections is to visit a school and talk to a Spanish teacher. Tell the teacher what you have told us. You don't want a class, just someone to practice with. Here, high school children who have recently entered from a Spanish speaking country gather in one of the Spanish teachers' rooms after school.

If you get a partner, tell them right off the bat that the only excuse needed for either of you to miss a session is to call and say it is not convenient today. But get them to agree to at least call so that you are not stood up. After a few sessions of what is very real work, it may become permanently inconvenient, but you can always find someone else. It isn't good to stick with just one partner for a very long time because you get in a habit of knowing them too well. You sort of quit correcting each other because their errors start sounding natural.

Once you make a few friends in the Hispanic community, it will get easier to find venues to get exposure to Spanish in a setting where Spanish speakers will be aware of your situation and slow down a bit to accomodate you. It often isn't just a lot of fun because it is so hard, but you must have drive or you wouldn't have come this far.

Toriz

hi! well, I understand your need for learn spanish, at this moment I am studying english and i need have someone to talk, so if you want I may give to you my email and we could learn spanish/ english by msn

xandrah

If your problem is speaking mostly, the best way to do it and don't be afraid or embarrassed to, is like Wolfang suggested... talk to Spanish speaking people. That's how I learned English, by living in the US for several months and don't having anyone to speak Spanish with.
But you should definitely join a class where you can interact with other students and the teacher, be able to listen and write.