Post: #1

Hola!

Linguists, I need you to weigh in with your thoughts on Interactive Softwares for learning Spanish. I have some Online Lingo Spanish disks that were pawned off to me from my dad, haven't tried them out yet. I've also heard good stuff about Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone levels 1-5 is currently on sale for $299.

I can speak soft conversational Spanish. I had 6 classes in university, plus I've had 4 short-term trips to Spain to practice some. My last trip to Spain showed me that I can hold my own in basic conversations, people tell me that my accent is fairly good for an English-native speaker (I'm starting to get that thick Castilian tongue going on, haha!). I'm getting better at reading Spanish, but my listening comprehension still sucks. I can get a rough idea of what people are saying most of the time, but can't really follow word-for-word unless they slow down for me. I also don't have the vocab to get into deeper topics (romance, history, work stuff, politics, etc).

I'd like to get totally immersed in this stuff to get from soft Spanish to more hard conversationalist skills, plus better listening comprehension. I've studied text books/exercises to build vocab, drill myself on verb conjugations, tenses, but I'm wondering if a software program would really be worth the investment for someone at my level?? I need to get better at putting these sentences together on the fly and then comprehending them when I hear them coming back at me. Would programs like RS, OL, or Pimsleur help a speaker at my level? Thoughts??

Post: #2

This site has an Intermediate Spanish program which addresses that problem.

http://www.studyspanish.com/help/intermediate.htm

I haven't done it but the site has a lot of free material which is excellent. They have a free grammar section and the "verb drills" allows you to really get all the verb tenses down through repetitive practice. The paid part addresses comprehension, which I haven't taken because having lived in Mexico I can already understand most of what someone says.

http://www.studyspanish.com/

Post: #3

I've found software to be only useful at the beginning stages. If you are conversational then read normal books, talk to normal people, and listen to normal podcasts.

The one piece of software I do recommend is something like Flashcards Deluxe so you can effectively remember the new words you are exposed to.

http://flashcardsdeluxe.com/Flashcards/

I strongly suspect someone who did well in Rosetta Stone 1-5 would even pass the A2 DELE.

The best way to get better at something is to practice. The best way to practice languages (past beginner) is to talk to native/proficient speakers of that language.

Post: #4

Thanks for the links, I will check those out! I also need to constantly drill myself on irregular verb conjugations, por ejemplo, poner, tener, et cetera.

I am tempted to grab the Rosetta Stone while it's on sale, since I've heard glowing reviews about this immersion software, although I worry that the first 1-3 levels might be more or less redundant for me.

I have a few women that I'm communicating with in Mexico now, plus my friends in Spain to email/chat/Skype with from time to time, so I'll keep hammering away.

Post: #5

Don't buy Rosetta Stone. It is too expensive and you won't learn much.

I suggest Anki for language learning. You can download language decks that include vocabulary and sentences and practice reading, listening and pronunciation. Besides, it's free. The only downside is that there may not be good decks for a particular language you're interested in.

I find corresponding with penpals pretty useful too. It sort of forces you to come up with more elaborate sentences and it may help you to improve your grammar. You could take a look at italki.com.

Anyway, as long as you force yourself to produce something with the language you're studying instead of passively learning new words or sentence patterns, you will make progress.

PM me if you have any questions.

Post: #6

Try Duolingo, it'similar to RS but free. You can take a shortcut in the learning tree to see where you are. If that's to easy I suggest reading books/watching novelas/finding people to Skype with.

Post: #7

No need for expensive spanish learning programs or any of that stuff. The best way to learn spanish is to:

1)Watch spanish television with spanish subtitles, just study each scene,translate the words, go through the pronunciation and repeat the sentences until you sound exactly like a native speaker. This will give you real spanish spoken in the real world, it will give you context and help you comprehend the fast spanish that you will actually receive from native speakers. A lot of these courses teach spanish at a pace that is way too slow......For spanish videos with spanish subtitles there are a ton on youtube, telemundo has a lot of their telenovelas posted with spanish subs on their channel. A lot of latino news videos are fully subbed in spanish. There are videos on youtube from every region of the spanish speaking world so you can adapt your spanish to the place you are planning on visiting.

2)To flex your comprehension muscles, find videos with the fastest spanish you can find, sinaloense spanish is pretty damn fast to me. After listening to it a while and trying to parse out the words switch to a more clear spanish video and see how much easier it is to comprehend and follow along.

3)Get a spanish girlfriend with little to no english, you will be forced to improve quickly. I met a lot of girls on a site called mobifriends just watch out for the shady Colombianas and Dominicanas. Get a bunch on your whatsapp so you always have someone to practice with.

These three things together will blow any spanish learning program out of the water. I hope that helps. Buena suerte.