Spanish sentence maker

[PB25]

Hello everyone,
I've been learning Spanish the past month. So far, I find myself having two issues: 1. I know what a word means when I read it, but if someone says, for example, the word "sandía" I'd have no idea what they are talking about unless I see it on paper. 2. I'm having problems creating sentences.

My question involves my second issue. Does anyone know of a website that would allow me to create sentences? When I ask that, I mean they give you a bank of words and have you combine the words to form a sensible sentence. I think this would help me a lot! Or if you can think of a better method, please let me know.

Thank you!

[Manuel]

As far as your sentence maker website is concerned: I don't know of any website that does what you suggest (if I understand you correctly) but I do know of the website below which creates example sentences for any word or verb you type in the search box. This is very handy to learn how to apply things in context. Check it out. You can type in any verb, conjugated or not, or a noun, a pronoun etc. and the site will give lots of examples of sentences, even with a button to hear it pronounced!

http://www.123teachme.com/translated_sentences/sp

[Villa]

Originally Posted by PB25

Hello everyone,
I've been learning Spanish the past month. So far, I find myself having two issues: 1. I know what a word means when I read it, but if someone says, for example, the word "sandía" I'd have no idea what they are talking about unless I see it on paper. 2. I'm having problems creating sentences.

My question involves my second issue. Does anyone know of a website that would allow me to create sentences? When I ask that, I mean they give you a bank of words and have you combine the words to form a sensible sentence. I think this would help me a lot! Or if you can think of a better method, please let me know.

Thank you!

The problem is you have to understand about the way we learn a second language. Think about how you learned your first language. You spent a few years just listening to English unable to talk, then you started to talk, then you learned to read and lastly to write. Well it is the same thing with your second language. You can't write Spanish well until you can read Spanish. You can't read Spanish until you can speak Spanish. And you cannot speak Spanish well until you can understand Spanish. This is why you need to study Spanish and listen to Spanish a lot.
That being said, you can use the written language as a guide to help you learn Spanish. Make flash cards of important Spanish words and phrases. I will sent these importante Spanish words and phrases in a private message. You must watch TV in Spanish, listen to the radio in Spanish, get CDs and audio downloads of audio Spanish. Put them on your I-Pod or cell phone as I have. Right now while I am writing this I am listening to the television in Spanish in the background.

Read below to find out the stages we go through to learn a second language.

Second-language learning or acquisition can be divided up into five stages: preproduction, early production, speech emergence, intermediate fluency, and advanced fluency. The first stage is preproduction, also known as the silent period. Learners at this stage have a receptive vocabulary of up to 500 words, but they do not yet speak their second language.Most learners go through a silent period but some take less time than others. Some learners start speaking straight away, although their output may consist of imitation rather than creative language use. Others may be required to speak from the start as part of a language course. For learners that do go through a silent period, it may last around three to six months. During this silent period learners must be studying and listening to the second language.
The second stage of acquisition is early production, during which learners are able to speak in short phrases of one or two words. They can also memorize chunks of language, although they may make mistakes when using them. Learners typically have both an active and receptive vocabulary of around 1000 words. This stage normally lasts for around six months.
The third stage is speech emergence. Learners' vocabularies increase to around 3000 words during this stage, and they can communicate using simple questions and phrases. They may often make grammatical errors. The stage after speech emergence is intermediate fluency. At this stage, learners have a vocabulary of around 6000 words, and can use more complicated sentence structures. They are also able to share their thoughts and opinions. Learners may make frequent errors with more complicated sentence structures. The final stage is advanced fluency, which is typically reached somewhere between five and ten years of learning the language. Learners at this stage can function at a level close to native speakers.

[Mozzo]

The difficulty with auditory training is that we are adults. It's too easy for our minds to stick on unfamiliar sounds, so we spend time pondering that, trying to decipher... then more speech has been aired to us, and now the whole context has been lost. It's not like reading a page, where you can stare at a word until you remember.

Auditory comprehension must be built gradually. Two seconds of speech can easily contain enough words to confuse a beginner! Break your learning exercises down into small pieces. CDs and YouTube videos are very patient. You can stop and replay as often as you need to, without frustrating a real person.

I heartily reccommend getting a copy of Total Recorder (cheap) and Audacity (free). I record all kinds of samples, then load them in Audacity and use the tools there to slow speech down. Just slowing speech by 5%-10% or so makes quite a difference. Once you catch on, you can resume listening to a sample at a normal pace, and even speed it up a bit to push your comprehension.

Also worth mentioning, is that many learning websites offer audio clips with their flashcards. You can build up vocabulary one word at a time if that's what it takes.