I’m wanting to know what any of you have done to successfully learn spanish. I’m not interested in you youngins as much as any of you older guys and gals like me, over 50.
I’m hoping one of you like myself with little beginning information can direct me to a good program, book or source to begin learning.
This is for personnel reasons, not construction. My daughter married a few years ago into a large beautiful hispanic family. She has blessed me with a very handsome grandson just last year.
While my son-in-law and most of his family speaks primarily English I thought it respectful I should learn to speak spanish better.
I started trying to learn using a book and cd from Berlitz but it seems a tad harder than I expected.
Thanks for any help.
This old gringo Bob
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Replies
Find a conversational Spanish class at your local Junior College. You need to be immersed in the language, books and tapes don't cut it for me. I've tried several times.
You could also watch the Spanish channel with the closed caption on so you can see and hear the words.
I'm looking into the classes. My wife is an Associate Dean of Liberal Arts and has been pushing me to take an evening class.
I hadn't thought about turning on the subtitles and watch tv or maybe changing the language in any of my movies I have and watching. This might be a great supplemental help as I progress, thanks.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
If you know another language, it helps. There's just different rules, often difficult to comprehend at first. But you know the hardest language already. They say English is the most difficult to master.
Classes and immersion are the best. DW edits textbooks in Spanish, and knows Portuguese and German as well. She keeps up to date by watching Hispanic cable shows, and reading the free weekly newspapers from the local Hispanic community.
Fluency probably isn't important. Your new in-law family will be impressed that you've shown the effort just to bond a little (and if you ever want to hang with the hombres behind the cochera, there's a great little book called 'Mierda' full of useful slang).
The slang is the idea, not to say it but just know it as one passes by old uncle pedro.
My daughter early on thought her husbands old uncle was using a term of endearment to call, or begin talking to, her. Come to find out he was calling her skinnyass white girl. I told her she might just let it go and start refering to him as old brown terd. She chose to correct him and he hasn't called her that too often since.
There's one in every family.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
I sometimes watch the Spanish channels with the sound muted.
That way, I can look at all the minimally clad hotties that seem to be on all the time, and make up my own dialogue for them.
We just got that channel and the babes are hot but i cant figure out why nobody looks like the Mexicans i see around here.???
Bobby it is usually because they have lots of money and don't need to come to the U.S. Looks can take you a long way anywhere in the world.
That's a completely different kind of lesson. But if you show a real interest in learning Spanish, then no one will look at you funny for watching Telelmundo.
try behind the wheel spanish by Mark Frobose , you can get it on amazon.
Thanks I'll check that out.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
I liked that one, too, or maybe it was called Spanish In Your Car. At times it wasn't quite loud enough to overcome the wind noise in my Festiva with a roof rack, but there was a certain subliminal effect to listening to it while driving the 8 hours each way to see my Honduran then-future fiance.I also listened to a LOT of hispanic radio and learned and sang along to Spanish language love songs. The nice things about songs are:
- limited vocabulary, so you have a chance of actually mastering some
- lots of variations on a theme/different ways to say the same thing, so you get a sense of how the language is used; things like what different word orders are acceptable, different tenses, turns of phrase/colloquialisms, etc.
- repetition - popular songs come on over and over again
- easy on the ear - it's music, after all, and there are different styles of Spanish language music just as there are different styles of English language music.Once I had found a song or two that were particularly catchy, I'd go online and search for the lyrics, then look up the words I didn't know in a Spanish-English dictionary. Plus, I carried a pocket dictionary with me *everywhere*. I also have a larger, hard-back Spanish-English dictionary for the less common words, and a hard-cover Spanish (no English) dictionary for when I feel like looking up etymologies and getting a fuller understanding of a word and related ideas. I'll start out with looking up a word, and invariably find many words I don't understand in the definition, so I'll look those up, too. Sometimes, I'll do the English-to-Spanish-and back to English again thing.The immersion thing really helps a lot, too. If you are around any native speakers, try to speak Spanish around them as much as you can, ask them to correct you when you make mistakes, and then just go for it. The best way to get the accent is to pretend you already have it; you know, how you can fake a Spanish accent when speaking English, and it sounds all hokey? Well, fake the Spanish accent when you're speaking Spanish. Then it doesn't sound hokey at all. Don't be afraid to make mistakes - just make them confidently, let someone correct you, and then repeat what you said, only correctly.Good luck. It's worth it. And it's never too late. I haven't quite hit 50 yet, but I'm getting close. And I still can't understand my fiance when he's too lazy to speak clearly, but I can understand a LOT more than I did 6 years ago, and his family and friends all compliment me on my Spanish.Rebeccah
Thank you very interesting !
I suspect when your being ignored as if your not speaking clearly a good whacking is universally understood.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
<I liked that one, too, or maybe it was called Spanish In Your Car. >
I learned French in my car . . .
Forrest
Did it go..
"mon Dieu! C'est mini!"?Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Repairs, Remodeling, Restorations
They kill Prophets, for Profits.
get back to your pushups!
sweet!
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Spanish is pretty easy for most gingos, like me...as long as you stick with it and practice every day. The best thing about the language is that it follows simple rules for pronunciation and spelling. And there are usually only one or two words which define or describe a particular thing or activity.
The verb forms can be a bit difficult to grasp but they follow the same conventions as they do in english so it's not impossible to learn.
Compare that to English with it's many unconventional words, spellings, pronunciations, changing slang, as well as social and regional distinctions.
One of the nicest things about trying to speak spanish is how Latinos respond to any attempt by gringos to communicate using their language. I've almost always found them to be very warm and helpful when I try out my limited vocabulary on them.
You've been given some good advice so I'll just add a software program which I like and has been highly recommended by others.
Instant Immersion Spanish Deluxe v2.0 by Topics Entertainment. It's available at Best Buys and other software sales places. Probably on http://www.Amazon.com too.
There may also be an updated version.
thanks
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Learning Spanish or any other language is a little like building. As in building, there's a lot you can learn in classes and from books. From these places, you can learn the grammatical structure, vocabulary, rules of pronunciation and so on.
Also, like building a house, there's nothing like having at it and learning by doing. You need to hear Spanish and speak Spanish. That's the way we all learned English.
I took four Spanish courses in college. I studied and ended up getting better at each level. I started out making a C in the first course and ended up making an A in the final course. I didn't learn to speak Spanish, however, until I had a full-time helper who didn't speak any English. I used Spanish daily and learned a lot. He was a legal immigrant, by the way.
jag.... i got linda ronstadt's cd... cantatas di mi padre ( or something like that )
and i read all the english translations ( words ) in the little book......
played that cd over and over again.. drove my family nuts
but... it helped
Very interesting, I could load it on my mp3 player and spare my wife.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
c'mon..... half the fun is trying to convince the whole family to sing alongMike Hussein Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Classes are a good bet. I haven't personally found the tapes to be real useful without some instruction.
For basic vocabulary, you might have luck with a spanish to english, english to spanish dictionary. Keep one in the truck, one in the home library (bathroom).
Look up a word a day like "hammer" in the english to spanish part, then flip to the spanish definition word/words, in the spanish to english part, you'll learn the different variations that way. the University of Chicago used to put out a good paperback version.
Also, if (if!) there are latinos on the job site, hold up an item every day and say:
"como se dice" (komo say deesay) while waving the item around. That's the way I learned most of my construction vocabulary. Most of them were happy to teach me a word a day.
My grammar is terrible, but I get the idea across: "Tomorrow we are cutting this boards all exact twelve feet"
k
I thought about the construction spanish book that I found, but maybe later. I'm not sure that I would need to say,"Lay the tarpaper here," or ,"Flash this window better," to my daughters in-laws just yet. Maybe later.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
One of these days I'll read an entire post before making a fool of myself... thanks for having a sense of humour about it.
The Spanish/english english/spanish dictionary would work well for family vocab as well.
k
No problemo, dude.
See I'm speaking it already.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Que Pasa!!!. I am taking classes right now at the University of South Alabama. My second course class starts next tuesday.I have that construction spanish book, Bought it at Lowes for $4. its a good book but has no words for soil.
theys and spanish progame for kid on sunday morning at 9 am central"Que Pasa" is the name of it. I think its on PBS,not sure.we have a spanish crew and they know Im trying to learn so every morning they start talking to me in spanish"Que Pasa amigo, buena dias" Nada nada. "wano trabaka"
All kid's shows on PBS and Nick seem to have a Spanish flair to them. Handy Manny, Dora, Diego, Sesame Street, and a few others I can't remember. My 2 yr old can count to diez in Spanish already.
soil: suelo or tierra will do
and if they pretend to not understand: No me friegues!
Or, as James Thurber said, "We go now to garrick to become warbs."AitchKay
I think I need a thurber/english english/thurber dictionary.
k
or, that's what she said?
I just googled it, for yucks --The story was,"The Black Magic Of Barney Haller," a great story about language barriers and ESL.Thurber always cracks me up -- My daughter just gave me "The Complete Cartoons Of The New Yorker," for Xmas -- 68,647 cartoons!Laff Therapy!Here's a good Thurber one from that book:(Woman standing at the window with the drapes drawn back in her hand, calling back over her shoulder) "All right then, don't come look at the rainbow, you big ape!"Aitchkay
My wife hired a tutor to loin as teechers can use it.
I tried but only learned one phrase cause i could compare it to Jersey tawk.
YO Tango Hombre.
It means im hungry.
I say this to every Mexican i meet while rubbing my stomak. They all know what in saying and are afraid to cuss me out knowing im a spanish tawker of the foist order.
I wonder if I can insult and cuss here if it's in a foriegn language. If this had just been said in spanish would anyone be banned?
Say like
"Me pican"
I got this through the Google translator I found
http://www.google.com/ig?hl=en&referrer=ign_n
The phrase isn't meant to you just a test. If I get booted oh well.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
I can't imagine why "Me pican" would get anyone banned. It means, "They itch (me)." Now, if you included what body parts were itching, maybe...Rebeccah
Actually I typed into the google translator, bite me. uh oh!
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Why don't you ask your in-laws to help you?
They're LA I'm Tulsa. Distance
Just A Guy With A Hammer
YO Tango Hombre.
That means "I want to dance with men".
That's why they leave you alone.http://www.quittintime.com/ View Image
"sacapuntas de lápiz"
Sounds really bad....LOL
"Un gato negro en mis pantalones"
You said "lapiz" and "pantalones"http://www.quittintime.com/ View Image
Jag,
Pretty much what everyone else said,,, also
Stick w it and have fun. I'm sure your new family will be happy to help you out.
I would describe myself as able to drink, play cards, meet girls, and work in Spanish. This, of course, is a result of, working w spanish speaking guys, and going out after work w them.
I always wanted to be able to read Don Quiote in spanish. Maybe someday.
Best of luck, Harry
You won't learn grammar, but a walk down the aisles of Lowes whilst reading the signs will teach you lots of words.
One note: I have two Hispanics that have worked with me for years. One speaks English with a thick accent and bad grammar, but can understand what you're saying to him very well. The other speaks perfect English, with perfect grammar (he took several years of English in HS & college) and little or no accent. He has a hard time understanding me when I speak. Contractions and slang really mess him up.
http://www.quittintime.com/ View Image
The wife mentioned about everything in Lowes being in spanish to. I'll just have to walk slower and pay more attention. I'm old they won't notice anything different.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Just learn Latin, and cover more ground.
I speak very fluent Spanish, Como ta bien, Chebrolet..my Chebby man.
Actualy what I do know I gleaned from Pablo Neruda ( a Chilean Poet) and Listening to Carlos Santana..that guitar guy (G)
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Repairs, Remodeling, Restorations
They kill Prophets, for Profits.
I speak very fluent Spanish, Como ta bien, Chebrolet.
I *wonder* what you're talking about.
k
Yes if for no other reason respect for Santana, Adouma.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Then there's always French --"Come untie my shoe, Madam Muzzle?"AitchKay
:-)
Convert to LDS (Mormon church). Go on a mission. They will spend 3+ months teaching you Spanish with full immersion. Then you get full immersion in the country you've been sent to. 2 years later you will be fluent. Down side? You don't get to pick where you go, so you could end up learning Swahili and going to Tanzania, or you could end up in Detroit.
:-)
I read LSD and got excited there was an old friendly way to learn. Bummer when I read the rest. Thanks for the moment. Probably have to be the brown acid anyway and I hear that's still bad.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Perdón, no inglés.
"Preach the Gospel at all times; if necessary, use words." - St. Francis of Assisi
I used to volunteer as an EMT in our town by the interstate. Occasionally a van transporting illegal Spanish speaking immigrants would wreck. Bad injuries. Multiple casulties. Very stressful to not communicate on a basic level.
There was a class offered for Police officers which taught basic phrases like:
Are you hurt?
Please don't move
Do you have a medical condition?
Etc.
They also taught phrases Police should know for their safety-names of weapons and phrases
Trap him
Kill him
Shoot hinm
Etc.
I took the class for the medical phrases. At the end the instructor mentioned what we learned was in our short term memory and would need to be practiced for some time before it stuck. I didn't keep up with it.
A few months later a mini van with nine non English speakers rolls over a guard rail. I remembered how to ask my patient not to move. He replied in excited machine gun Spanish. I remembered how to say I don't speak much Spanish.
After that, I was having trouble recalling what I had learned and started mixing up the officer protection phrases with the medical phrases in my mind.
I kept imaging what it would be like to lay in a ditch and have an excited gringo tell you:
Please don't move.
Are you hurt?
Please speak slower.
I have an icepick and a bomb.
So, I clammed up. Got the job done and the guy flown out, but knowing a little ended up being worse than knowing nothing. I should also have kept with it.
In my opinion, a guy should commit to a certain level and keep up with it.
On my honeymoon years ago we went across the border to Metamoros (sp?). We got turned around but I knew I couldn't be but a mile from the border where we crossed. Know one understood me and I was amazed of all the englishwords that freakin "border" would not be understood, as close to it as I was.
Finally a person with a translator came up. When I entered into his translator the word border he says to me,"Ah, International!" and proceeded to draw a map. It seems I was actuall 12 miles or so away. Darn those streets.
It was a humbling experience that has given me much sympathy for anyone here that doesn't speak english.
Just A Guy With A Hammer
Edited 1/14/2009 1:55 pm by jagwah
I've been to Matamoros too. I suspect there is more English understood there than is let on.A friend of mine went to Paris and got lost. He asked a woman for directions."Excuse me Maam, do you speak English?""No I don't"