General Spanish Learning

In our last post we talked about how to practice Spanish verbs. We highlighted that it's important to focus on speaking while learning Spanish verbs. This type of Spanish verb conjugation practice really helps in terms of being able to form the correct verb conjugation while in a conversation. Today we're going to have a look at how to learn Spanish in a more general way.

Spanish verb conjugation practice is something that you must include as part of your learning. In addition to this you must improve your vocabulary, pronunciation and grammar in general, as well as your reading, writing, listening and speaking skills. There are lots of things to learn and practice when starting to learn Spanish.

One of the best ways to get started is with a course that focuses on your listening and speaking. Because of this, an audio course or some software that has lots of audio is the best way forward. These courses are very effective because they make sure that you are using your Spanish right from the start. A lot of other courses don't give much time to listening and speaking which results in students being able to read and write very well. But as we have discussed in other posts, most people are looking for ways to be better communicators.

This is not to say that reading and writing isn't important. Writing is a great way to bridge the gap between understanding and speaking. When writing you have more time to think about the construction of sentences, what vocabulary is best for what you need to say, and the conjugations of the verbs. It is also a really important skill in its own right.

To make sure that all of the skills are covered, you should spend time doing lots of different things. Read books, write letters, speak with friends, listen to Spanish radio. This type of learning makes sure that you're not relying on one skill. It's important to do things that are specific to your level, and don't start with real Spanish as you're just going to confuse yourself.

So, as well as Spanish verb conjugation practice, there are lots of other things to do to improve your overall Spanish.