these are a few of my tips that i have learned to pick up the spanish language just a little easier. i’m not fluent in spanish YET but i am constantly learning.
phone language
my cellphone in spanish
change your entire phone over to spanish. i changed my phone language over to spanish which was extremely helpful so that i can see spanish daily. to take this to the next step i would say the words out loud so that i can hear what they would sound like or i would look up the words i didn’t know how to say in google translate so that i could hear the correct way to say it.
listen to spanish shows (or music)
i was watching a youtube video (i forgot what channel it was on) and the girl in the video said to watch tv shows — or your favorite tv shows — dubbed in the spanish language so that you can get familiar with hearing people speak in that language, and you can break up the words.
you can cheat for a little while and use subtitles but it’s best to use your active listening skills to pick up words, intonation, and dialect without subtitles (unless they are in spanish of course).
learning songs in spanish helps to learn the language because you are saying things to a rhythm and naturally it’s easier to learn things that way.
watch youtube
there are many accounts on youtube that freely teach spanish. one of the accounts my dad introduced my family and i to was SpanishWithPaul (or as my sister likes to say EspanolConPaulo which is the same thing but in spanish).
he teaches at a slow pace and brings things from old lessons to keep your on your toes and test your recall. paul also uses language that you would use everyday when interacting with other spanish speakers. he’s actually very helpful and my dad is the go-to because he is further along in his lessons than everyone else (so we kind of depend on him to help us translate things).
daily practice
every day practice is the key! talking to other people who are learning or native speakers helps you with your own speech and pronunciation. add spanish words to your daily vocabulary, label things around your home and when you see the words say them aloud.
if you want to take it to the next level then try to create sentences with the words that you see around you.
duolingo
duolingo app screenshots
duolingo is a free app that you can download on your phone to practice languages daily and learn them. it gives you the option to learn many languages like spanish, english, german, italian, korean and more.
this app allows you to interact with a computer in a texting format so that you can practice your spelling and you can speak as well just by tapping on the icon button. i genuinely love this app and it so helpful!
these are just a few ways that i have picked up spanish. do you know any languages? do you have any tips on how you learned a new language? let me know below!