How to Learn Spanish For Beginners

Feliz Cinco de Mayo

2011-05-05T01:25:00.001-04:00

The fifth of May is a very important date in Mexicos history. It is not the date of their independence but it marks an unexpected victory over the French, strangely enough it is celebrated more in the United States. Let me let Wikipedia tell it best....

Cinco de Mayo (Spanish for "fifth of May") is a holiday held on May 5 that commemorates the Mexican army's unlikely victory over French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862, under the leadership of General Ignacio Zaragoza Seguín. It is celebrated primarily in the state of Puebla and in the United States. While Cinco de Mayo sees limited significance in Mexico itself, the date is observed nationwide mostly in the United States as a celebration of Mexican heritage and pride. "Cinco de Mayo is not a Mexican holiday—it is an American Civil War holiday, created spontaneously by Mexicans and Latinos living in California who supported the fragile cause of defending freedom and democracy during the first years of that bloody war between the states." Cinco de Mayo is not Mexico's Independence Day, the most important national patriotic holiday in Mexico.

Source: Wikipedia

If English is your second language you may be interested in a good foundation course.

Feliz Pascua - Happy Easter

2011-04-16T21:00:00.004-04:00

Most of the Spanish speaking world is Catholic and celebrates Easter. Easter is known as Pascua. A more literal translation of Pascua might be Passover. In the Bible, Jesus' Last Supper with his disciples was the celebration of Passover. For this reason the two observances are inextricably connected.

¡Feliz Pascua de Resurreción! - Is a more specific way to say Happy Easter and Pascua judía is a more direct reference to Jewish Passover.

Many people may have visions of a conejo de Pascua (easter bunny) bringing gifts (regalos) or eggs (huevos) on Domingo de Pascua. Of course the vision of the easter bunny bringing gifts or eggs is more of an American vision. In Spain, the tradition is to have 'la mona de Pascua' which is an Easter cake. Also the godparents of children may give gifts. The mona de Pascua tradition dates back to the 15th century.

During the período de Pascua (Easter Season) there is Semana Santa (Holy Week) leading up to Easter Sunday. The Easter Season continues until the Pascua de Pentecostés which follows Easter and the entire season is 7 weeks.

This year Easter Sunday is April 24th. (El veinte y cuatro de Abríl).

If English is your second language you may be interested in a good foundation course.

Aguila Roja

2011-04-14T15:59:00.004-04:00

I spent a few weeks last month going through and catching up with a tv series from Spain called Aguila Roja. It's set in the 17th century in Spain (during the reign of Philip the 4th.) The title character is a Robin Hood/Zorro style character. His wife is killed and he vows to find the killers, ultimately he vows to fight for the innocent citizens of his village against those that take advantage of them or do them wrong.

It shows the disparity of classes at that time in Spain in stark contrast, it shows many intrigues political and otherwise with people vying for control of the government, with the Cardinal seeking support of the King to be Pope.

It is really a fun series. The episodes are a bit long - 1 and a half hours each. Right now there are just three seasons up on the RTVE web site. Hopefully they will be putting new episodes up soon.

The big buzz is that they've made the transition to the cinema in Spain and there is an Aguila Roja motion picutre which should be hitting screens about now. This series is at the height of it's popularity and is breaking viewership records. (Making it one of the most watched shows in Spanish history.)

It's not quite a soap opera or telenovela like you'll see in the imports from Mexico. It's more along the lines of a drama or action drama with some romantic content. Sometimes the language gets a bit edgy and there is occasional nudity and a fair amount of violence. So, this isn't for a 7 year old. (In fact, the early episodes were rated for 7+, the later ones at 13+.... I would tend to agree with the later 13+ ratings.) Of course, that varies a lot on individual preferences.

For me it's been a fun show to watch. There have been scenes that have just shocked me to my core. (Shocked my soul....) Things that I don't think would have passed muster here in the US for a primetime show. That much said it is a fairly well done show (good writing - good production - good acting) and I look forward to more episodes.

One thing that has been interesting is the difference in getting up to speed with Spanish from Spain vs. from Mexico. I find the pace to be much quicker... If you want to catch up on this great show.... here's the official aguila roja page at RTVE.

Oh... I almost forgot... the title of the show is Aguila Roja - which translate to Red Eagle - which is the pseudonym that the main character acts under.....

If English is your second language you may be interested in a good foundation course.

Many Thanks! Muchísimas Gracias

2011-04-12T18:40:00.003-04:00

I was pleasantly surprised to find our own site listed among the top 15 learning Spanish blogs as listed over at Masters in International Business. I wanted to make a post to "dar las gracias" (give thanks) for being selected and also let you know that there will be a post related to Easter coming soon. (And maybe another idea or two in the pipeline, but you'll have to wait and see what else is on the horizon.)

Once again gracias a todos (thanks to all) that visit this site and enjoy learning a bit more about the Spanish language.

Oh - and they list a total of 15 spanish language learning sites at the link above. You may want to browse the sites listed and find some other great resources for improving your spanish language skills. I really like to take any and every opportunity possible to improve and expand what I know about the spanish language.

If English is your second language you may be interested in a good foundation course.

Valentines Day in Spanish

2011-02-12T12:51:00.001-05:00

As you know, Valentine's Day is celebrated on February 14th around the world. It's name varies by culture. In the Spanish speaking world it is known as el Día de los enamorados, in some countries it can be known as Día del amor y la amistad, or Día del Cariño. It can even be known by the more direct translation: Día de San Valentín.

The practices vary by country. In places where it is known as the Day of love and friendship such as Mexico, Costa Rica and Ecuador it is customary for people to do "acts of appreciation" for their friends. To go along with the idea of Valentines Day I thought it might be good to include a bit of Spanish vocabulary to go along with the day.

Te quiero - I love you - (affection)

Te amo - I love you - (typically a deeper sense of love.)

Me gustas - I like you

Sé mi valentine - Be my valentine

Feliz día de San Valentín - Happy Valentine's Day

un abrazo - a hug

un beso - a kiss

amar - to love

la amistad - friendship

el amor - love

un amigo/una amiga - a friend (male amigo - female amiga)

una tarjeta - a card

un deseo - a wish

un regalo - a gift

una cara de amor - love letter

para mi amor - for my love

amor a primera vista - love at first sight

enamorado/a - in love

novia/novio - sweetheart/girl-boy/friend

el corazón - heart

Also, at least in Mexican Spanish it is common to hear people speak of their "Príncipe Azul" or literally blue prince - this is their equivalent phrase to match the "Knight in Shining Armor".

If English is your second language you may be interested in a good foundation course.

How to Say Happy Thanksgiving in Spanish

2010-11-24T22:00:00.003-05:00

When I first learned the Spanish words for Thanksgiving it seemed like quite a mouthful. Thanksgiving Day in the United States of course is the holiday that we celebrate on the Fourth Thursday of November. It is a day to give thanks for all of the blessings that we have been afforded here. The freedom, the opportunity and just life itself.

In spanish, Thanksgiving day is "el día de acción de gracias". Literally the day of the action of thanks. To wish someone a Happy Thanksgiving in Spanish you simply say "feliz día de acción de gracias!" In that way it is very similar to wishing a happy birthday (feliz cumpleaños) or Merry Christmas (feliz navidad).

If you want to try your hand at a bit of Thanksgiving Day history reading in Spanish, take a visit over to This wikipedia article which is a good coverage of el día de acción de gracias y la historia del dia (and the history of the day).

¡Feliz Día de Acción de Gracias!

Common Spanish Phrases

2010-04-23T23:55:00.003-04:00

Spanish, just like English is a language where a finite list of common phrases can come in handy. Sometimes you don't need to learn lots and become fluent in a language, you just need some basics. So, that's wht we're going to address here with some basic Spanish phrases and their English equivalents.

Also, as we see in English some sayings are common in different areas. Words and sayings that may be common in England, may sound out of place or not be understood in the United States (and that may depend on the region of the US.) So, keep in mind that you may find regional variations on some of these.

For each of them I will give the english equivalent first.

Yes
Si

No
No

(Those first two were easy weren't they?)

How are you?
Como esta Usted? (this is the formal way of asking...)
Como estas? (less formal - use with peers/those younger than you/friends/etc.)

Fine, thank you
Bien, gracias

So, So
asi asi

What time is it?
Que hora es?

My name is...
me llamo ....
(mi nombre es...)

and you?
y usted? (formal)
y tu? (less formal)

please
por favor

thanks/thank you
gracias

may I?
puedo?

you're welcome
de nada

Hello
Hola

Good Day
Buenos Dias
(sometimes just Buenos in casual conversation)

Good evening
Buenos tardes

Good night
Buenos noches

move it/come on
andale

where is....?
Donde esta....?

How much is....?
Cuanto cuesta...?

welcome
bienvenidos

I don't believe it.
No lo creo.

It can't be.
No puede ser.

Look!
Mira!

Goodbye....
adios/

see you later
hasta luego

until we meet again
hasta la vista

I don't understand (I don't understand it)
no comprendo (no lo comprendo)/ no entiendo

I'm sorry
Lo siento/ perdon

slowly please
mas despacio por favor

I may follow this up with a bit more in the future. Of course, these are very basic and those in the Unite States may already know many of these. But it can be useful to try to ad a few more phrases into your repertoire if there are some in the list that you haven't seen before. When I do add more I'll try to get into a bit more advanced listing of phrases.

This has given me the thought that maybe I shoul try to give some basics of Spanish for the self taught. Of course, with a couple of languages I have started out knowing just a few phrases and then studied just a bit more and dug a bit deeper. At that point the phrases start to make a bit more sense. The bottom line though is it helps immensely to have a good idea of the basics before you plunge in and start studying phrases and memorizing vocabulary words.

What basics? It's really more than just a few common phrases, and really probably is best put as a little dose of grammar. For instance, what do the verbs look like, how do you say I, you, he, she, it, us, they, etc..... and how do you work with verbs at list in the present tense. Are there other basic, easy rules that can spice up your understanding of the language?

This has given me some good food for thought and perhaps an upcoming series of posts. Other work is (and always seems to stay) busy these days. So, I may not be able to dig into that series quickly, but I will get there.

Spanish Days of the Week

2010-02-14T21:11:00.004-05:00

One of the first things you should learn in any language is how to talk about the days of the week. In Spanish this is no different than in any other language. For starters a week is una semana in Spanish. La semana is as you can see a female noun. When we talk of a publication as a "weekly", in other words a noun then you would call it un semanario. If instead you are using weekly as an adjective (as in a weekly appointment) you might say cita semenal. As an adjective semenalmente.

Today is hoy. Ayer is yesterday and mañana is tomorrow. (Yes mañana is also morning, so to say tomorrow morning you may hear mañana por la mañana.)

In Spanish the days of the week are not capitalized as they are in English.

lunes is the Spanish word for Monday. I always associated it with the word Moon and how close Moon and Mon- are....
martes is the Spanish word for Tuesday.
miércoles is the Spanish word for Wednesday - it has lots of syllables just like Wednesday is a longer word in English.
jueves is the Spanish word for Thursday.
viernes is the Spanish word for Friday.
sábado is the Spanish word for Saturday.
domingo is the Spanish word for Sunday.

Now, sometimes you might hear or see someone write about their Saturday routine.... which would be sabatino/a. So, when you use Saturday as an adjective it's sabatino. I don't (yet) know of equivalents for the other days of the week. But, this is an example that I have run across in reading a book not too long ago.

All of the days of the week in Spanish are masculine nouns and so if talking about just one you would use el, and multiple Mondays it would be los. So, if you talk about walking on Saturday.... Voy a caminar el sábado. Or, say you go for a walk every Saturday... Camino los sábados.

It's important to learn the days of the week, of course, one approach that you can take is to just jotting them down on a notecard and reciting them, reading over them a few times a day. Another way of course, is to make use of a flashcard program to memorize them. You may also make up a sentence or a song that might help you remember them.

With most words, it's pointless to think about any particular order, but with the days of the week I remember liking to learn them in sequential order. To be honest there was a time when I got Tuesdays and Thursdays switched and memorizing them in chronological order helped me to get that straight.

Good luck mastering the Spanish days of the week!

Spanish Language Version of Hulu

2010-02-13T16:31:00.003-05:00

I am frustrated with many things related to the media industry. Not only are dvds in region one usually limited to English French and Spanish, but because of the entire region encoding it can be a challenge sometimes to find even a spanish language version of many titles that will work without having to have a second dvd player, or a region free player... But now online video sites are as restrictive.

Many people may already know that hulu.com is restricted to the US only. Because they only have rights to distribute those titles in the US. Well, today I found a "Spanish Language" hulu by fox called mundofox.com. I was enthused to see quite a few familiar title shows from the Fox lineup available there only to find out that the content is not licensed for distribution in my area (the United States.) Now, given that some of these same shows are licensed for distribution with an English language track on the hulu.com site - it seems the net result is that the language is not licensed for use in the United States.

So... I did find another site like hulu.com with Spanish language content. This is maximum.tv Unfortunately they have a less familiar lineup of titles (less familiar to me). THat's not necessarily bad, I know a lot of people complain about dubbed movies and tv shows because many times you lose the gist of the original. (Jokes are usually not-translatable.)

However, I would really like to watch spanish dubbed versions of familiar shows. I KNOW they exist and are distributed overseas and all, but I am just not licensed to listen I suppose....

More and more I think the media companies still don't get it when it comes to the massive changes that the internet brings. For instance - going to hulu.com and playing a title should default to the language that the site is presenting to the web browser, but it should also give a drop down list of the other languages a specific title has been dubbed in and let the viewer choose. Who knows, maybe they're in the US visiting and really want to see something in their native language. Maybe they're part of an immigrant community. Maybe they're just studying another language and want more material to help practice their listening skills, but it really shouldn't matter.

Now, I know that technically if I get a message that content can only be viewed from a certain region... there are some ways around that, but my point is the world has changed from the days when distribution was limited to a single entity having rights to a region. It's now possible (and easy) for a single company to be able to distribute to viewers world wide. It's easy at least from a technology standpoint. The legality and contracts of the big studios need to catch up with the reality. I think they'd be surprised at what the level of demand is once the multilingual product was easily available.

Yes, I know that some specific networks (RTVE for instance) have their shows available online through their site. Believe me that is a good resource, but hulu.com has been somewhat revolutionary in getting the big US production companies to allow their content for free streaming online through one source. The revolution needs to continue to expand though.... even if it's not about "free".

I suppose to put as fine a point as I can on the issue that rubs me wrong is this. Technology over the last couple centuries has been tearing down barriers, making the world smaller and it frustrates me when companies put up artificial walls. These artificial walls benefit them by making more revenue from the various licensees I'm sure, but that model is under a lot of pressure. Tear down the walls!

I'm not sure if it's available outside the US - but Univisions Youtube channel is looking promising for combining content from their networks. Of course, Telemundo has their video portal as well (no full screen for their full length novelas that I can find...) (I know - pick pick pick....)

A good example of the frustrations though that a foreign language web surfer runs into in their search for foreign language content is the televisa video portal at esmas tv for only 100 pesos a month (around $10 dollars US) you can have live access to the following televisa channels Televisa 2, 4, 5, 9 y TL Novelas plus a 14 day archive of recent shows. It really sounds like a pretty good deal if you're into Spanish language programming.... but there's one thing that caught my eye... Disfruta en vivo en cualquier parte del mundo* - which means enjoy live in any part of the world* (yes that asterisk means the same thing in most any language I guess...) at the bottom of the page is the following....

*Este servicio no está disponible para USA y sus territorios. - Translation - This service is not available for the USA and it's territories. (sigh) Access it from anywhere in the world (but not the US). I know many people are frustrated with the blocking out of US media streaming to other countries - I am just as frustrated, it cuts both ways and it's due to the complex exclusive region licensing that these corporations have done for years. I know that the televisa prohibition on US viewers is due to a court struggle that found that Univision had the exclusive rights to online streaming in the United States.

In any case, there are a few options right now, but I'm hoping that in another ten years we will start seeing a time when the internet is a useful source no matter where you are for any kind of multilingual content that is available any where in the world. No artificial barriers, Fees are likely going to a be a part of any future successful model. Advertising supported may work, but I suspect in the future it won't ALL be 100% advertising supported and that's fine, it's the ridiculous "you may watch from anywhere but the US" or "you may only watch this if you're in the US" kind of walls.

What do you think?

--UPdate-- BTW - On a slightly related note.... aguila roja from rtve looks to my liking so far.

More Spanish Language Podcasts

2009-12-07T11:41:00.004-05:00

This post is going to focus on some direct links to some spanish language podcasts. Most of them are from international broadcasters and as a result are news updates. They vary in length from 14 minutes or so up to an hour long. I'm SOOOO glad to see many international broadcasters start to make their news updates available via rss feeds in podcast format.

A couple years ago I had pieced together some scripts to try to do the same, parse through a broadcasters web page for the latest audio download and then download it. It really was a pain in the neck mostly because they seem to always be redesigning their sites and that would of course break the way I was finding the audio. These days though mp3 is more common (at that time, many of them were windows media and realplayer streams that I had to stream and encode to mp3 on the fly.)

Anyway.... if you don't have a program to catch podcasts you may just wish to visit the links below and use firefox in combination with the down-them-all plugin to download all the mp3 links on the pages. By default it asks if you want to download one that you already have, but you can switch it off so that it ignores duplicates. I like news programs for listening practice and have also just started using audiobooks and audio cuentos (audio stories) as another way of improving my Spanish language listening comprehension.

I recently got a new audio player, a sansa clip plus which has been the large motivation for these recent link posts....

http://podcasts.voanews.com/podcastxml_local.cfm?id=162 Buenos Dias America from the Voice of America. Daily 30 minute program with a mix of news and other features.

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/rj/podcast/rss/spanish.xml NHK Radio Japan - for some reason they only show the most recent program in their rss feed.

http://www.rtve.es/noticias/ This is Spains national broadcaster Todo Noticias 5 is their news only broadcaster. This one isn't a direct link to an rss feed mainly because although I find many podcasts, most of them are feature programs and not the kind of news summary programs that I was looking for. (Resumen de noticias)

http://www.rfi.fr/radiofr/podcast/Podcast_emision_en_espanol_10h00.xml - Radio France International News bulletin at 10AM UTC in Spanish - I think this one was the one where I was not able to download anything past the last week or two in spite of a months worth in their feed.

http://www.rfi.fr/generique/langue/dynamiques/podcasting.aspx?rubrique=actues - listing of all RFI podcasts - (at the bottom of the page you can find links for their other hourly updates.)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/mh/ - BBC's the Mundo Hoy (world today). 14 minute news program.

http://feeds2.feedburner.com/codyscuentos - Cody's Cuentos - classic fairy tales in Spanish. As an adult I can't really say that I remember the originals that clearly anymore - but these are a fun listen.

Of course there are more out there, but these alone can keep you listening for hours.

Learning Spanish from Audio Books (Audio Libros)

2009-11-30T11:40:00.003-05:00

There is a lot to be said for audiobooks. Sometimes I'm just not into the idea of sitting and reading for a while. I do read quite a bit, but for instance if I'm driving or doing something else that may require my eyes, reading isn't a good option. Audio books can fill those voids of time very well. It shouldn't be a surprise that there are audio books in spanish just as there are in English. Personally I prefer reading to pick up new vocabulary because I can stop on a word if I need to so that I can write it down. However, audio books can be a good way to hear correct pronunciation and can help you verify the pronunciation of words that you have read, but maybe never heard.

Audio Books are referred to in a variety of ways in Spanish. AudioLibros is one term. Although some also use the phrase "leer escuchando" or "to read listening".fonolibros is another term used and you may also see libros audibles or even libros de audio. Many sites will have audio books with human narrators, but today voice synthesis has come far enough that there are many more books that have been processed by computerized voices. I do find these a bit more challanging to understand than a human voice. Many will prefer the human voice for audiobooks because of the flexibility of expression that a computerized voice is typically lacking.

One very good resource for freely downloadable spanish language audiobooks is albalearning.com. Here you will even find the text of the books in case you like to read along with the audio. The content ranges from full books down to short stories (capurcita roja/little red riding hood.) They are all available in mp3 format and all of their content is free of charge.

leerescuchando.net is another good resource with many free downloadable audio books. You do need to be a registered member of the site before you can download though.

leemp3.com - has a huge collection of around 3200 audio books. From what I've seen most of these are automated computer voices (albeit fairly good ones) and I think most of the source material is public domain works.

If you are into newer releases you can buy cd audiobooks at audiolibrosenespanol.com. Of course, there are other retailers for the more traditional cd audio book. Some of them will offer mp3 downloads as well, but it's a disappointing minority of titles that appear available in this format. For many of the English language mp3 retailers I have found it frustratingly difficult to actually find spanish language titles in their catalogs. (I can find "learning spanish" titles, but not spanish language versions of some of the best sellers on many of the sites.)

There is one more link which is to a forum in Spain. There are links here to many audiobooks. Some are public domain and some aren't. Foro Vagos - audiolibros. You do need to register at the forum to be able to browse more than a couple of posts.

Hope you enjoy the many hours of listening you have ahead!

Learning Lots of Vocabulary is definitely the way to go.

2009-11-06T17:22:00.003-05:00

In the last year I feel like my Spanish language vocabulary has literally exploded. It's been about that long since I started using spaced repetition software (mnemosyne) and I do use it daily to review words. I also make notes of any new words I come across that I've not seen before or don't understand and add them into my card database in bunches every week or two. Lately it's been getting longer and longer between adding new words in part because I don't run across nearly as much new vocabulary. When I started out with my review of Spanish my idea was to read, read read and then absorb new vocabulary by context and when necessary looking up frequent words. It was relatively slow and the pace has really picked up dramatically with my newer approach of the flash card software and looking up everything I don't understand.

After thinking back through all of these things here is how I would suggest someone go about starting to learn the spanish language. 1) get a flashcard program like anki, mnemosyne, supermemo. Start learning the pronunciation enter the letters on one side of the card and pronunciation example on the flip side (most texts will start with a guide using English words as a pronunciation example.) Learn these first and then get a basic feel for grammar.

What do the verb conjugations look like? Get familiar with the gender of nouns and that adjectives should agree in number an gender to their nouns. Once you've familiarized yourself with some of the basic grammar concepts then start learning vocabulary and LOTS of it. I should note, by familiarized it means that you've seen it and are comfortable with the grammar ideas. It doesn't necessarily mean that you know every detail of the grammar and structure of the language. If you find sticking points in the grammar, let it pass and make a note to revisit it in the future.

Learn lots of grammar. Read books, magazine, newspaper articles, websites, etc. Keep a notebook or index cards and write down words you don't understand, look them up and enter them into your flash card program. Review your cards each day. Don't belabor them, let the software worry about making sure you know them. Spend at least 10 minutes up to 30 minutes a day reviewing and rating how well you know the words. Sleep on it and repeat the next day. Don't feel like you have to memorize the list completely in a day, learn it well enough so that when the word is re-shown in a few moments you have it and then leave it until tomorrow.

Keep acquiring vocabulary no matter what and then go back and start reviewing the grammar concepts that were fuzzy the first time through and you by now likely have examples of in writing. Also if there are any sentences or grammar examples that in your reading you still don't understand even after dealing with the vocabulary, try and use these examples to make sense of grammar. Dual language texts can be a good resource as well because you will have the story in your native language as well as Spanish.

Never stop adding to your vocabulary. Depending on how aggressive you are at picking up new words within 6 months to a year if you review words daily you should have a couple thousand words in your vocabulary (more if you have separate vocab words for each verb conjugation form.) As I've thought through my language study ideas I've asked myself the following question.... If you were to be dropped into a foreign country tomorrow and had the choice between the following two advantages which would you take? a) Perfect understanding of the languages grammar and familiarity with the 100 most common words. b) little understanding beyond basic grammar and 3000 word vocabulary. Every way I turn it I would go for the 3000 word vocabulary ANY day. Why? basic vocabulary (*100 words) will only get you so far even with perfect grammar. How do you order food? Not many foods are going to be in the top 100 most used words of the language. Even your most basic questions such as where is the bathroom with a 100 word vocabulary may not be possible because bathroom is not usually in the top 100 words in a language.

On the other hand if you have a 3000 word vocabulary and only basic grammar skills you will be able to handle most situations at least as well as a child. Children, without a perfect understanding of grammar can still express desires, wishes, needs and pose questions that adults understand and can respond to. Even the most crudely phrased "I need bathroom" is pretty understandable without an article, or the words "to go to the". You may not sound brilliant with only basic grammar, but you sure won't sound brilliant with a 100 word vocabulary either!

So.... I'm still improving my Spanish and my focus is still on more and more vocabulary, but I must admit to being at a point where I'm bored with many reading materials which probably means that thanks in large part to mnemosyne I've achieved most of my goals with the Spanish langauge.

Spanish News Podcast for Beginners

2009-07-10T15:38:00.002-04:00

I remember when I started trying to follow Spanish language news broadcasts it was hard. Everything moved so fast, the words just flew past and I was lucky at first to be able to pick up one or two words that I recognized in each sentence. Over time I've improved and don't have the challenges that I did in keeping up, but.... I was still looking for good "slow" or easy spanish news audio to recommend to people.

Today while checking my email I saw an ad for this site and I took a look and it's EXACTLY what I've been looking for to recommend. (I wish they were out there when I was intently trying to keep up with spoken spanish language news broadcasts.)

The site is NewsInSlowSpanish.com and I did start to listen to the first item they have on the page. It's a nice slow pace for the beginners out there. I've got to admit it's painfully slow for me to listen to now, but if you're just starting out this is a must use resource!

I remember many years ago running across the VOA simple English broadcasts and thinking it seemed painful and slow, but understood that for a certain audience of language learners it would be a perfect resource. I looked around at that time and found Francais Facile.... (Simple French) broadcasts, but at that time nothing in slow, simple Spanish. I'm glad to see that this resource is now out there for Spanish language learners to take advantage of.

They also have bonuses on their site like a transcript, grammar study, quiz, etc.... nice resource for the beginner or intermediate Spanish language speaker.

Nearing the bottom of my word "deck" - can't say enough good about mnemosyne and other SRS

2009-07-04T14:23:00.003-04:00

Woohoo... I finally have fewer than 100 words that I haven't studied in my mnemosyne word deck! I almost got to that threshold a couple weeks ago when I went back through my notebook and added another page of words and imported some morse code to review.

I do have a page worth of words to add still, but I keep inching closer and closer to the bottom of the deck. On the down side that means that I have about 170 words to review tomorrow. I feel as though I'm getting into more and more obscure words though, I have to admit that I've been looking quite a few up in english when I've found the Spanish definition.

It's not quite been a year since I started into using SRS (spaced repetition software) like mnemosyne and I really think it has paid off GREATLY. I can't begin to describe how much my comprehension of both oral and written Spanish has gone up, plus my ability to remember the Spanish language word for so many things. I highly recommend that you make SRS software a part of ANY language study. Then become a word collector to grow your database of words and drill from the target language to your native language and vice versa. I know I've talked about this approach on my study languages site. But the more time I've spent using mnemosyne the more I've realized how I really should have been doing this from the start.

The thing is, I've used mnemosyne to memorize other bits of information too and it's been a pretty efficient way to do so. Sometimes I will mistakenly tag a word as remembered when it wasn't (as I hurry through the list), but it will inevitably come back around and be tested again. I've spent maybe 20 minutes or so a day reviewing words. When I have more time for a few days I'll usually delve into a few new words to work down the stack of new words to learn, but during busy weeks I just work at maintaining the words I've already study.

I've found that I do best in the mid to late morning (10:30/11 or so) as the sessions around that time seem to go very well. I'm sure everyone's different though and you may find that you have a different time of day that you are more mentally sharp and able to remember your set of words with ease.

There have also been times that I've slowed down my reading or watching/listening to Spanish language media so that I could better catch up with my new words to learn. (At one point there were well over one thousand unlearned cards (a month or two ago) and I've managed to whittle that down through making it a part of the daily routine.)

The bottom line is that you should make software like anki or mnemosyne, jmemorize, supermemo, fullrecall in your quest to learn any language. You'll be impressed by the quick gains in vocabulary you make.

Spanish Vocabulary Word List collector

2009-05-16T22:44:00.003-04:00

That's about how I describe myself sometimes..... a Spanish Vocabulary word list collector. I carry a small pocket sized notebook with me most of the places I go. It's about the size of a Reader's Digest magazine and I write down all sorts of things inside. If I think of a neat idea, or see an unusual product I may write down information about it to look up later.

More importantly for how to learn spanish though is to use it to collect vocabulary words that I don't recognize. Used to I would stop and look up words as I came, that was quite tedious and I never seemed to remember them for long. SO, writing them down so that I could later put them into my SRS program, Mnemosyne.... that has really helped me to acquire vocabulary faster. I currently have about 5700 cards in Mnemosyne (2 cards for each word since it tests you each direction.) Of those, only about 470 haven't yet been seen and I have three pages worth of "new" words in my notebook to look up and create cards for.

Of course, I do have a few typos here and there in my collection of words, but I've found my ability to follow spoken Spanish has gone up quite a bit since I've been plowing through this word "collector" strategy. I've had some duplication (it's hard NOT to really). But I think it's part of a good strategy to study languages.

Where do I collect words from? Audio, tv are a couple sources since spanish is fairly easily transcribed from pronounced words.... most of my new vocabulary comes from the things I read though, magazines, local spanish language newspapers, books, etc.

Vocabulary is not language certainly, but after learning the proper sentence structure and about the various parts of speech (verb conjugation, present/future/past tense, etc.) Expanding your vocabulary is really essential. One of the things that I find interesting is that I seem to keep finding cognates for English words (many that I may not have known) as I go through this process.

Spanish Language Pronunciation

2009-04-02T11:40:00.003-04:00

It's interesting to me that I've seen so much interest in the rolling the r post. Spanish language pronunciation is usually very easy and straightforward (once you pick an accent to work on... more on that later.) That trilled r gives more of us english language speakers a problem than anything else. It can be discouraging, but don't give up just because that's hard. You'll either do it or you won't and the worst case if you don't is that you'll have more of an American accent.... Sure you should try to make it better, but look how many people speak English with foreign accents that we still understand. I highlighted those words because that's the goal of communication anyway isn't it?

Anyway, if you've looked through Spanish language dictionaries you will notice that there aren't those pronunciation guides like we have in English language dictionaries. You know why that is? It's because Spanish is really fairly easy to pronounce. There aren't great numbers of rules and exceptions. The vowels and consonants have fairly consistent pronunciations that typically don't have a long a list of correlary pronunciation rules to go along with them.

The only grey area is deciding how to approach some of the vowels. Different parts of the Spanish speaking world treat the ll (double l) differently. Some places you'll hear a soft j sound. Other places you will hear it more as a y (as in the word you) sound.

C is another consonant that can have different interpretations depending on the region. At the beginning of the word it should be the hard c (english k). In the middle of the word, some places you'll hear an s-like c, in Spain though you will hear more of a lisp with a th sound. So a word like conocer could sound like kownoser or kownother (soften up the th a bit so that it's not TOO strong.)

Understanding the pronunciation should be one of those things you work to master first, because studies show that even if you are "just" reading, the auditory area of the brain is active. Most of us think the words as we read and having a correct pronunciation (if only envisioned in your mind) can help improve the odds you'll recognize that word when you hear it spoken.

The Spanish language is fairly well known to have a good orthogrophy (this means that the written languae and spoken language match up very well.) However, you will always find regional accents. I've found that many politicians speaking publicly are more careful to enunciate and pronounce words "correctly". By contrast "man in the street" interviews are likely to uncover all sorts of variations on pronunciaiton of Spanish, just like in English.

About Me

2009-03-01T21:02:00.002-05:00

I have studied Spanish off and on for the better part of 6 years. I started out with two years of Spanish Language lessons in High School. I must admit though that in retrospect we didn't learn much about the Spanish language, present tense conjugations and some basic words. I studied another language in college and learned more in the first month or so than I felt that I had learned in all of my High School Spanish class.

Anyway, languages have always fascinated me and after "grazing" through three languages other than my first, English... I spent several years listening to a bit of this and a bit of that with very little focus. When I turned thirty years old though I decided it was time to focus on a single language for at least five years and see what kind of progress I could make.

We had, by this time, several Spanish language television networks on our local cable system (Univision, Telemundo, CNN en Español and Discovery en Español) and I was also somewhat interested in short wave radio where there is plenty of Spanish language content. So, taking into account the above as well as our DVD collection having a good number of movies with secondary Spanish language tracks, the Spanish language seemed the best choice.

In that time I have learned a lot about the Spanish language and ways that I learn. I have wasted a lot of time, but I've also found some things that work really well. I started this site to try to help people get started on learning what is a very important language in the world today.

Rolling the R

2009-02-14T21:15:00.001-05:00

I don't know how many people have told me that they quit trying to learn spanish because they couldn't roll their r's. They claimed that was really holding them back and they quit because of it.

It seems really strange to me. I've studied Spanish off and on for a total of 8 years I guess and until the last week I couldn't coax more than a couple of ticks out of a rolled r. I can't say that I've practiced and practiced day in and day out. I think I may have tried a few times, but gave up on the idea and worked on vocabulary instead.

As I've increased and improved my listening skills I've noticed that not all native spanish speakers roll their r's. This actually makes sense (how many English speakers do you know that have something that they don't pronounce "correctly".) But at the same time it makes sense that our tongues should be more or less the same and it should be possible for someone to learn how to do it.

It was funny, the other day I was saying el tenedor (the fork) and thinking about a telenovela I had seen where the priest had dramatically rolled the r's at the end of words. Without really trying out came a rolled r that caught me by surprise. Maybe 2-3 seconds. The rest of the day I practiced off and on. In the shower, the car, whenever I had a chance by myself to try words with either the rr that should be rolled or the trailing r which could for dramatic effect.

I also read and pretty much verified that I had the tongue in the right place for this. Essentially you need to have your tongue curved up so that the tip of it (just) touches the roof of your mouth about where the roof of your mouth slopes back behind your teeth. Really more than trying to voice the sound I've found I make more of an haaaaa sound which causes the tongue to essentially flap in the breeze of my exhale.

I read on one site someone claiming that it was really easy to roll your r's, just the same as purring. Well... for those of us that can't/haven't purred before.... that's not very helpful.

There is a common rhyme though that you can use to practice:

Erre con erre cigarro,Erre con erre barril.
Ra'pido corrren los carros, Los carros de ferrocarril.

Sorry, the accent didn't seem to work out there, but it gives you the idea anyway. I understand that Beyonce used this rhyme to practice for hours to get the sound down. I've also found that the tongue can get a bit tired at times.

If it doesn't come at first don't let that stop you from learning the language, push ahead, keep trying and find other things to learn. Of course, try to get a sound as close as possible to the native rr's, but if you can't don't quit!

Privacy Policy

2009-02-01T21:16:00.001-05:00

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Learning Spanish Vocabulary Words

2009-01-05T16:30:00.003-05:00

I have wasted an awful lot of time in my study of the spanish language. For years I studied and read and didn't consistently look up new words and put them into some sort of database to drill. I was lazy I guess. I thought if I just kept running across the words I would learn the most common ones and wouldn't need to try to memorize words.

If I were living in a Spanish speaking country that would probably be true, slow but true. We may have a lot of immigrants here in the United States, but we're not yet a Spanish speaking country. (At least not the majority.) So, that approach has taken me through about 5 1/2 years of self study with still a lot to learn with vocabulary.

However, about 6 months ago I started using some SRS or Spaced Repetition software to manage and deal with new words. The idea is that the software is like the old fashioned flash cards you would use to memorize information in school. Except SRS software is smarter than those note cards. Those note cards you just went straight through over and over the entire deck trying to memorize and then the next day and the next and by then you were bored and put them away. When you dug the cards back out you started all over again and probably spent almost as much time as the first time around.

Well for learning the spanish language and new words spaced repetition is a hug improvement. The software decides when to present a card based on how well you claim that you knew it when you last saw it. If you had no clue, it goes back into the deck to be re-shown very soon. If you claim you know the word cold then you won't see the word again for a day, if you really know it next time it won't reappear for two more days, then 4 and the time gradually is stretched longer and longer.

The whole idea behind this is based on a study of memory and how we move things from short term memory to long term memory. The entire goal is to move these words and their meanings into long term memory. In the six months that I've been using Mnemosyne (a spaced repetition software program). I have noticed a DRAMATIC improvement in my vocabulary comprehension. Listening to the news I am frequently noting words that I didn't know until the last several months and I'm approaching 99% comprehension of the dialogue in news and documentaris/telenovelas and other shows.

This improved vocabulary has also even helped me pick up other words that are new in listening. Since there are fewer unknown words in a spoken sentence it's easier to key in on the one that I don't know and write it down to look up.

If I were you I would look into adding SRS software into your language study routine and make some time to review some words each day. It takes me about 5-10 minutes or so to review about 50-75 words. Some days I'll try to add a few new ones to the queue as well. With a richer vocabulary you'll find that you are understanding writen and spoken spanish much more easily.

Learn Spanish News

2008-12-08T01:44:00.000-05:00

I've added some learn Spanish news in the sidebar. The newsfeed is from Google and should include news items related to learning Spanish.

While these news items are in English about the Spanish language, I have also included some links in the right hand sidebar that link to some resources that include spoken and written Spanish.

These come from other sites that I've found around the web and include Google News in Spain and Google News in Mexico among other resources.

Welcome to the How to Learn Spanish for Beginners Blog

2008-12-08T00:08:00.000-05:00

I'll be using this blog to act as a guide to help you learn Spanish. This is going to be an approach to how to learn Spanish for Beginners

Learning a language is a long term commitment and not something you can do overnight. I'll be using this space to talk about different courses (both free and paid) as well as other ideas to improve your language learning. I may even delve into the idea of giving some Spanish Lessons here.

Thanks for stopping by and Congratulations on your choice of learning the Spanish Language