Hurriedly And Simply Proposals To Master Spanish   by Ben Pate

in Education / Languages    (submitted 2011-03-16)

It is not difficult to work with Spanish workbooks any time and any where. Whether one has professional instruction and the advantage of a school and classroom setting or not, the process can be easy, painless and maybe even fun. But what is true for learning a language is true for everything: the student will get out only as much as he is willing to invest in terms of time and effort.

There are a lot of different systems and methods, but for self study and the independent student without much in the way of formal academic resources to back him or her up, it is a good idea to break the language up into four areas of study with a languages courses. Not in any particular order, the student will do best to funnel efforts into the areas of writing, reading, listening for comprehension, and speaking. Each of these areas can be studied alone or with others and there is no cause for alarm or worry.

Reading is as good a place to start as any. In fact, it is probably the best area to start with because it's very easy to start at a basic level. The independent student would do well to pick up a basic, beginners' text book or work book. Any brand will do at this point because the instruction is so basic that anything will help. The student should go through the book and try to pick up the basic flow of the language, the way it works, how it is constructed, and some basic vocabulary.

After this basic foundation, it is time to start reading. The student should purchase a bilingual dictionary and start reading things. In the beginning, stick to simple newspaper articles, then magazine articles and children's storybooks. After some time and vocabulary building, the student can move on to books.

Simultaneously, another important step is to start writing. This is difficult to do alone because it is not just a matter of spelling, but verb tenses and other issues of sentence structure must be taken into account. It becomes necessary at this point to find a person who understands this area to correct the student's work and offer suggestions to improve.

Listening is the easiest of these four areas to practice alone because it may be the most passive. The easiest way to start is to find a movie that is both spoken and subtitled in Spanish on DVD. Watches one scene and try to understand it. Replay the scene a few times, then add the subtitles. Then, play the English version to see what still needs work. Another trick is to choose one show on a Latino channel on TV and view it as regularly as possible.

After building up a base of knowledge in the first three fields, it can be important to try to speak. In the beginning, it probably is enough just to try to mimic the sounds made by others. Later, as confidence grows, it may be best to hold simple conversations with anyone who will tolerate it. As a student becomes more advanced, it will be necessary to begin to speak with native speakers about more and more advanced topics.

About the Author

After some time studying the language to spanish language course, the differences in accents and regional dialects will become apparent. This is half of the fun in one's quest to learn Spanish. There is as wide a variety between the language and culture of Guadalajara and Puerto Rico as there is between Alabama and Australia. But this should be a journey that is expected to last a life time, and these are the first few steps through a language courses.