The method you choose to follow your Spanish course, whether it’s a book, software, app or online material, is going to determine how successfully you learn.

Today I’m going to give you 8 tips that will make your Spanish language learning smooth and fruitful.

1. When you start a new lesson, always make sure you listen to the dialog or conversation BEFORE reading its transcript and translation. It’s harder this way, and often you’ll understand very little at first, but it’s also the most effective way to develop your listening skills well and fast.

2. Don’t just read the Spanish material quietly or in your head. Make a point of reading out loud all the Spanish dialogs, vocabulary and examples in your course, as if you had an audience. This will help you develop your speaking skills fast, and will boost your confidence.

3. Keep track of the Spanish words and phrases you’re having difficulty with and come back to them regularly. If your course comes with audio flashcards, repeat the words out loud along with the native speakers to retain them more easily. By reviewing vocabulary frequently you’ll avoid gaps in your knowledge and will acquire a good Spanish accent.

4. Do you have any grammar queries? If your course comes with an online forum, post them there to get an answer. To make sure answers are accurate, check that they are given by experienced teachers rather than other students.

5. Play the audio material in your course regularly. The more you listen to it, the better you’ll understanding it, and the better your accent will be.

6. A good Spanish pronunciation will not only help you communicate better, but it will also allow you to understand native speakers without trouble. Words you find difficult to say are likely to be also the ones you have difficulty understanding. Work on them as hard as you can to bring both your listening and speaking skills to a higher level.

7. Ideally you should study, at least something, five or six days a week. Sometimes you may only have ten minutes, but that’s OK. Regular contact with the Spanish language will soon translate into fast and steady progress. Cramming several hours of learning in one long session from time to time won’t be nearly as effective in the long term as short and systematic learning.

8. Reviewing the Spanish you’ve learned in the past weeks and months is the key to success. Having a firm knowledge of the basics is essential if you want to get to a high level; without it, progress will be painful.

Apps have revolutionized the way you learn Spanish. You no longer need to wait until you have some free time to sit in front of a book or a computer, and make painfully slow progress. If you have an iPhone, an iPod or an iPad, you can access your Spanish lessons wherever you are, at any time. That means fast progress.

It means, too, the ability of learning the Spanish language while you do other tasks, from traveling to work to relaxing in the tub.

Learning the Spanish language with apps is entertaining, with the good ones at least. Good apps encourage you to learn further, and help you master speaking and understanding.

So what makes a Spanish learning app good? Which features should it contain?

Good Spanish apps are put together by professional language teachers. They include a substantial number of audio files, all of which must be recorded by native speakers. Whether you purchase an app with a Spanish conversation course, a grammar guide, kids’ lessons, games, quizzes or exam help, it must contain audio files. Without them, your listening and speaking skills will not benefit, only your reading skills will.

Other essential features in an app are: Spanish transcripts of all the recorded material, and English translations so you don’t have to consult a dictionary. It should also be content-rich, easy to navigate and visually attractive.

With so many Spanish language courses to choose from, access to free samples before you purchase the app is of great assistance. Unfortunately, many app creators do not offer you the chance to play with the content before you part with your money, but the best do.

On top of all these features, a good Spanish app will give you a link to the course producer, the chance to email your technical questions, and will offer you periodic upgrades.

I have created for you my Spanish Podcasts for Beginners App with these and many other components: new mp3s or videos on a weekly basis; Spanish transcripts of all the content including dialogs, vocabulary glossaries, grammar lessons, and exercises with their solutions; on and offline playing, and more.

Spanish vocabulary audio flashcards from Maria Fernandez’s course

Forgetting the gender of the Spanish nouns you’re supposed to know well is both frustrating and demotivating. Today I’m going to walk you through the reason why those mistakes are made, and I’m going to give you an easy solution.

My fifteen years teaching Spanish have shown me that learning and reviewing vocabulary the wrong way is what leads to those mistakes.

You may be wondering, then, if there is a way of learning new Spanish nouns that will allow you to get the gender always right. The answer, without any doubt, is ‘yes’. Here are the two steps you need to follow:

1. Every time you come across a new Spanish noun, make sure you learn it with ‘el’ or ‘la’. When you’re reviewing vocabulary, do so with ‘el’ or ‘la’ in front of all the nouns.

2. Use recordings by native Spanish speakers to learn new vocabulary, in particular audio flashcards.

In all my Spanish courses this is the method I use. It’s fast, efficient and a great time-saver.

Learning nouns with their article the first time you come across them takes the same effort as learning them on their own, and it will save you a lot of time and frustration later on. So, for instance, instead of learning that:

the word ‘flor’ means ‘flower’

Always learn that:

‘la flor’ means ‘the flower’

Doing so will ensure that you associate ‘flor’ with ‘la’ in a natural way, just like Spanish native speakers do.

My second vocabulary tip is to use audio flashcards. The advantage of those is that you can hear the new Spanish words and their English translation, as well as practice and review them.

The task of learning new Spanish vocabulary becomes significantly easier with audio flashcards. They are an essential tool for acquiring a good Spanish accent, and a powerful resource for reviewing efficiently. Throughout my Spanish courses I have created audio flashcards to make your vocabulary learning experience smooth and enjoyable. I’ve included them in my online course, my Spanish Podcasts for Beginners, kids’ course, videos and my iTunes apps.

Briefly, learning new vocabulary following the two steps I’ve described in this article is not only more efficient in the short, medium and long term, but also much more enjoyable.

Do you want to learn Spanish? Don’t have time? Welcome to my Spanish language course app!

This Spanish language learning app brings you mp3s, videos and pdfs directly to your iPhone, iPod and iPad without having to connect to your computer.

This easy-to-navigate and content-rich app costs only $1.99 from iTunes. It gives you a new episode every week, and access to the back catalog of dialogs, vocabulary flashcards, grammar, pronunciation and numbers from my Spanish course.

Every Spanish learning mp3 and video in this app comes with a pdf transcript. You can download all the mp3s, videos and pdfs, play them on and offline, keep them forever and go back to them as often as you want.

You can access this app wherever you are, whenever you want. It allows you to learn Spanish in your car, on the train, the bus, while waiting, exercising, bathing or cooking.

There are many other features to make this app a must for Spanish language learners: you can contact the show with one click, request new features, resume playing if you’re interrupted by a call, play the mp3s in the background, highlight your favorite mp3s and videos, and get special offers.

If you have any queries, please contact me.

FREE APP SAMPLES

At Spanish Bookworld you can listen to the free mp3s, watch a video and download a pdf from this app.

SPANISH APP SCREEN SHOTS

Here are some screen shots from my Spanish course app:

At Spanish Bookworld you can see more screen shots and find out more details.

I’m offering a 12-month subscription to my Spanish course for only $75.

My Spanish course includes:

• A 60-day money back guarantee
• 45 beginners’ online lessons
• 45 kids’ lessons
• Downloadable mp3s
• Downloadable videos
• Online mp3 listening
• Spanish language learning articles
• A Spanish verb ebook
• Beginners’ quizzes
• Kids’ quizzes
• Full access to the members-only forum
• Answers to your language questions by me
• First-rate customer service

At spanish-bookworld.com I have put plenty of details about my course. I’ve also added the Lessons 1, 2 and 3 free samples and free quizzes.

The online lessons, mp3s and videos come with: dialogs, flashcards, grammar, pronunciation and numbers.

All the online lessons are interactive and multimedia, and all the Spanish words and sentences in them have been recorded by native Spanish speakers.

This course has been written and created by me, Maria Fernandez, a highly experienced native Spanish teacher. This is the third Spanish course I’ve published. I’m currently working on a series of Spanish language learning ebooks as well as adding new material to my online course. Find out more about me and Spanish Bookworld.

Here’s a free Spanish language learning quiz from my Spanish course. It’s the first of the two review quizzes that you get in Lesson 1. Press Start to play it:

You can find many more language learning quizzes in my Spanish course. Those quizzes help you review what you learn in the online lessons, downloadable mp3s and videos.

All my quizzes come with listening comprehension questions, grammar drills, vocabulary and number exercises, spelling practice, and much more. Hope you like them!

This is what the Spanish language learning videos in my course look like on your iPod and iPhone:

On my Spanish Bookworld website you can download a free video sample from my Spanish course and put it on your iPod and iPhone, and you can also watch a free video sample online.

You can download the videos and mp3s in my Spanish course when you subscribe. Subscriptions cost $19.99 per month and come with a 60-day money-back guarantee.

My Spanish course contains 45 lessons with 5 videos and 5 mp3s each, plus online lessons, kids’ lessons, articles, an ebook and a members-only forum where you can post me all your Spanish language questions.

Knowing the six forms of the irregular Spanish verb estar in the present tense will allow you to build and understand essential sentences, questions and answers. You can listen to the six forms, together with all the Spanish examples in this post, and play the interactive drill, in the Lesson 4 – Grammar of my free Spanish course.

1. Estar in the present tense

Here’s what the Spanish verb estar looks like in the present tense and how you translate it:

2. Examples with estar

Here are some examples with the six forms we’ve just learned, in both Spanish and English:

3. When to use the verb estar

Estar is one of two Spanish verbs that translates as ‘to be’. The other verbs is ser, which we’ll learn in a future post.

The verb estar is used to indicate:

• Where people or things are
• Moods and feelings
• Physical conditions
• Physical appearance at some point in time
• Temporary rather than permanent conditions

To illustrate these five points, here are five examples with their English translation:

4. Speaking drill

Can you say these ten sentences in Spanish? You can see the solutions in Spanish and hear them said by native speakers in the Lesson 4 – Grammar of my free Spanish course.

1. How are they?
2. They’re angry
3. Which hotel are you (vosotros) in?
4. We’re in the Arizona hotel
5. Where are you (tú)?
6. Is he at the hotel?
7. Is she on the beach?
8. You’re (tú) looking very elegant
9. I’m on vacation
10. Are they on vacation?

To get this and other grammar lessons:

In my experience as a Spanish language teacher, here are three mistakes that can make you waste precious time, ruin your confidence and eventually give up. As you will see, they are easy to avoid:

1. Rushing through your first Spanish lessons

Having a sound knowledge of the basics will determine how fast, and how well, you can learn Spanish.

If you’re a complete beginner, concentrate on each and every lesson of your course, from the beginning, for as long as you need. Do not rush yourself. If a lesson takes you three hours, so be it, but never allow yourself to skip any material.

Basically, the more time you put into the first lessons, the faster you’ll be able to learn later on.

If you’re past the beginners’ level but have some gaps in your knowledge, stop learning new material and go back to the beginning. This may sound drastic, boring, defeating or simply mad, but it will work wonders and no doubt boost your confidence in no time.

To succeed, follow this routine: review all the words you have learned so far. Make sure you understand all the grammar you have covered. Do not allow yourself to make more than one mistake per exercise or drill. Listen to the dialogs until you can say them out loud along with the recordings.

Remember: small gaps at the beginning become enormous holes by lesson twelve. By lesson twenty, giving up will feel like the only way out.

2. Not focusing on the Spanish pronunciation

Working on your pronunciation might not be the obvious thing to do as a beginner, but it has many great advantages:

• The better your pronunciation is, the better you’ll be able to understand native speakers.
• Having a good accent is hugely rewarding and motivating.
• Having a good accent from the start also allows you to avoid bad pronunciation habits that aren’t always easy to get rid of.

The best way to improve your pronunciation is to concentrate on one letter of the alphabet at a time, and then on words you’re having difficulty with. To get a good Spanish accent, make sure you learn only from native Spanish speakers.

Acquiring a very good accent requires patience and perseverance, no doubt, but once you start working on it you’ll notice some improvement almost from the start. Guaranteed!

3. Learning Spanish nouns without ‘el’ or ‘la’

Whenever you learn a Spanish noun with its article, you’re avoiding endless future mistakes. In other words, you’re saving yourself a lot of time and unnecessary, repetitive work.

As you may know, the Spanish gender rules can help you ‘guess’ the gender of many words, especially those ending in ‘a’ and ‘o’, but there are many nouns that will let you down if you try to guess their gender. That’s why it’s safer, and faster, to learn them all with their article when you first come across them.

The good news is that any good Spanish course gives you every new noun with its article.

Warning: Unfortunately, there are many Spanish courses that still teach nouns without their article. To avoid wasting your time, make sure the Spanish course you get gives you the new vocabulary with ‘el’ and ‘la’. The simplest way to do it is by checking the free lessons before buying the full product. If there are no sample lessons, get a different course!

Useful Spanish learning material

Free Spanish course
Spanish pronunciation lessons

All the kids’ lessons in my free Spanish course are interactive: they include multimedia flashcards you can see and hear, speaking exercises and listening drills.

Like all my other Spanish lessons, mp3s and videos, they have been recorded by native speakers.

The kids’ lessons in my courses include topics such as: the family, numbers, animals, colors, names, greetings, professions, the time, asking questions; useful words like ‘the’, ‘a’, ‘some’, ‘and’, ‘I’, etc.; the alphabet, the days of the week, food, clothes, and more.

If you want to see the full list of topics, here is the lesson plan.

To show you what the interactive multimedia lessons for kids in my free Spanish course look like, here are five snapshots:

 

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