Spanish Self Study - What should I learn?
Hola!

I've been learning Spanish for a few months, including Skype lessons. At the moment, I spend most of my self-study time learning verbs endings, as per my teacher's homework, Present, Preterite, Imperfect, as well as Regular, Irregular, Stem-changers, etc.

I know these are really useful, but not all sentences are just Subject - Verb - Object - Noun/Adjective/Adverb, for example I am not very good at connectors such as ademas de, ahora, casi, desde, etc. (had to look those up!). Because of this, I struggle with a lots of conversation where sentences don't follow the basic structure above, so I feel like I'm not progressing!

My question is, what should I be focusing on to improve my communication in 'real' conversations. For example, should I try and memorise more connectors? Should I write out sentences in English, then try to translate them into Spanish, first without help, then using a dictionary? I would be grateful for any practical advice.

Gracias!

Amit

Question

Spanish Self Study - What should I learn?
Hola!

I've been learning Spanish for a few months, including Skype lessons.  At the moment, I spend most of my self-study time learning verbs endings, as per my teacher's homework, Present, Preterite, Imperfect, as well as Regular, Irregular, Stem-changers, etc.

I know these are really useful, but not all sentences are just Subject - Verb - Object - Noun/Adjective/Adverb, for example I am not very good at connectors such as ademas de, ahora, casi, desde, etc. (had to look those up!).  Because of this, I struggle with a lots of conversation where sentences don't follow the basic structure above, so I feel like I'm not progressing!

My question is, what should I be focusing on to improve my communication in 'real' conversations.  For example, should I try and memorise more connectors?  Should I write out sentences in English, then try to translate them into Spanish, first without help, then using a dictionary?  I would be grateful for any practical advice.

Gracias!

Amit

Answer

Hi, Amit!
As a Spanish Tutor, what I would recommend you to do is basically learning some connectors, since they are vital in Spanish, and then write down sentences you say in English throughout the day. When you have some free time, translate them into Spanish and post them as a notebook in Italki. That way yo u will learn sentences and vocabulary you will really use and native speakers can correct your exercises to let you know what you´re doing right or wrong. Reading in Spanish can be very effective too, starting with fairytales and moving on to more dense books. Let me know if you need any recommendations!
Good luck!!!

Answers · 1

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