How do you become fluent?

[Mozzo]

Well I spent about a month, kicking off from vocabulary builders:
http://www.youtube.com/user/ebpaes/videos
http://www.youtube.com/user/MrLearnSpanish/videos
http://www.youtube.com/user/LearnEnglishSpanish
http://www.youtube.com/user/Vocabuflash


Then moved to "canción infantiles"
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLA548720D06B86EF0
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL240EB432F973E8E0


Now I'm wading into music for older children:
http://www.youtube.com/user/jorgeembon/videos
http://musicalibre.com.co/(this was free when I used it, you have to buy the CDs now but they do still play 1 minute of each song)
http://www.youtube.com/user/DisneyJuniorES/videos


As well as listening to short stories "audiocuentos"
http://ntic.educacion.es/w3//recurso...ntos/index.htm
http://www.interpeques2.com/peques5/peques5.htm


Here is an English teacher in Spain that posted about 150 podcasts over the course of several years
http://ssl4you.blogspot.com/ (works better if you click on articles than use the links on the right)


Just keep looking around, and you'll find more material than you have time for !

[Wahooka]

Thank you very much!!!!

[Valeria]

Great resources!

To achieve fluency? paso a paso! necesita paciencia :-)

Fluency happens when you don't even notice it. Naturally. It will probably hit you when you smoothly construct 4 sentences without a single mistake, only to discover the average native speaker does a mistake every 3rd sentence :P

Don't try to hard. If you're immersed in Spanish it'll come to you.

Es me consejo.

[Villa]

Originally Posted by Valeria

Great resources!

To achieve fluency? paso a paso! necesita paciencia :-)

Fluency happens when you don't even notice it. Naturally. It will probably hit you when you smoothly construct 4 sentences without a single mistake, only to discover the average native speaker does a mistake every 3rd sentence :P

Don't try to hard. If you're immersed in Spanish it'll come to you.

Es me consejo.

¿Cómo has aprendido tú Valeria el español?
¿Has estado totalmente inmerso en el español antes?
La inmersión total es, por supuesto, la mejor manera de aprender español
o cualquier otro segundo idioma. Es lógico.
He tenido una inmersión total en español e italiano.

[Valeria]

¿Cómo has aprendido tú Valeria el español?

Todavia estudio el espanol. Yo no lo entiendo muy bien. (I still study Spanish. I don't know it very well).

I never had immersion in Spanish. But I have experience in becoming fluent from null... it happened to me in two languages actually, English and Russian. English though I studied from the age of 6 and in school, and Russian from the age of 12 with my grandmother teaching me (forcing me to accept my half Russian side). I immersed myself in reading and writing resources, and TV, and despite the fact I've never been to an English-speaking or a Russian-speaking country, I can speak both those languages fluently! (I should mention some people in my family speak Russian and I grew up with Russian-speaking classmates so that was an unfair advantage I had).
That's what I'm doing now with Spanish, creating my own immersion with spanish tenenovelas, spanish computer games, and what not :-) Heck if I could trade my Russian boyfriend to a Spanish one I would, just for the extra immersion! (lol)

[chileno]

That's funny Valeria...

If you follow my method, you'll find yourself immersed in that language without the need to be "corrected", initially and you would be reading, writing understanding and speaking in a short period of time as opposed to years of repeating. What's more, like you said, you have two more language to fall back to plus your native language in order to understand and apply Spanish.

The best of my method is that you can apply it to any language in the world as along as you understand how to look up words in a paper dictionary of that foreign language.

[Valeria]

If you follow my method, you'll find yourself immersed in that language without the need to be "corrected", initially and you would be reading, writing understanding and speaking in a short period of time as opposed to years of repeating. What's more, like you said, you have two more language to fall back to plus your native language in order to understand and apply Spanish.

It's funny you should mention that because I'm exploiting it as much as I can. In Russia there is a show on the culture channel "Spanish from scratch in 16 hours" (испанский с нуля за 16 часов) with polyglot Dimitri Petrov... where they basically film him teaching a class of 8 people (mostly actors or class C celebs) Spanish and I find it extremely useful, interactive and entertaining. That show is helping me immensely! In Hebrew sadly there aren't many resources I can exploit. In English, galore!

The best of my method is that you can apply it to any language in the world as along as you understand how to look up words in a paper dictionary of that foreign language.

Paper dictionary? Pshaw! How about android smartphone Collins Eng-Esp dictionary!

[chileno]

Originally Posted by Valeria

Paper dictionary? Pshaw! How about android smartphone Collins Eng-Esp dictionary!

That helps, but you are missing the point of knowing the foreign "alphabet" order and that, my friend, ranks high on my things to do list, when it comes to leveling what I now in my native language.

[Valeria]

That helps, but you are missing the point of knowing the foreign "alphabet" order and that, my friend, ranks high on my things to list when it comes to leveling what I now in my native language.

No sé que es muy necesario. I mean, números and the más técnico parts of the language are the things you tend to learn last. Me parece.

[chileno]

Originally Posted by Valeria

No sé que es muy necesario. I mean, números and the más técnico parts of the language are the things you tend to learn last. Me parece.

You bet it is necessary.

Count in two's or three's in a language that is not your own and see how far you get. No doubt you know the numbering system in that language...

Same thing goes for all 4 math operations in the foreign language.

All that is part of fluency.

Although I recognize all that, I still do most of my math in Spanish, but it is a matter of practice. The minute you start doing it, your head starts to crack. Sooner or later you gain fluency on that side too.

The rest, I will explain later.


I liked that one. Do you know more Chileans?