Lela J. Skeen

I'm using it now for Spanish and I love it very much. I just wish it had more languages. But from using it I have seen a huge improvement in my Spanish!

I am a bilingual and have been speaking Spanish since I was a child. I started speaking it immediately after learning it from some beta version of Rosetta Stone (that I think no longer exists) and a few other programs. I started speaking it as soon as I knew a few phrases because when I was a kid I wasn't afraid to make mistakes. I communicated for a long time with my mother who knows some Spanish and I found some penpals and quickly made friends in the language and learned a LOT from them. Now I'm trying to become officially fluent and brushing up on Duolingo on duolingo.com. It's harder this time because I'm focusing on the grammar. Focus on being able to read and write in it and picking up the spoken language will be easier. Start by watching your favorite movies in Spanish (on your DVD player if you have one) with English subtitles. Once you get familiar to hearing it (watch the movies every day) it will be easier to speaking in daily life.

I think everyone over here has gone through this moment at least once in their life, I did when I was just starting to learn english at shool. I think this is super normal, specially if you're talking with a native speaker. I'll surely go through this once I move to the Spanish; I can't speak english well! So I'm sure there will be a lot awkward moments for me in the future. I'm not nervious about that at all! I think awkward moments are a great motivation to improve the language. So not everything is bad! Why everything supposed to be bad, make me feel so good?

Good question, Sophia...this is a hard question to answer very well, because realistically only you can know what you need to put in your paper and what your argument is. What you want to ask yourself is "WHY is slang not necessary?"....and then jot down your answers as a kind of list, and then expand on them afterward (brainstorming). Also, when you write your paper, make sure you do NOT write anything about something being "your opinion" or "I think" or "to me"....in other words, don't include any statements in your paper that state that your argument is only your opinion, because it is redundant (an argument paper is ALWAYS someone's opinion) and it weakens your argument when the reader is reminded that the argument your making is really just your opinion. It's like saying "my argument isn't really based on anything other than how I feel"....not good. So yeah, brainstorm your arguments as to WHY slang is unnecessary by using short bullet point ideas, and then when you're done with your list, elaborate on each one, and then combine them together using standard compositional techniques. As for humor, the gratuitous inclusion of a choice "slang" word or too that is funny or silly should be an easy way to get a laugh. Good luck!

The best time to teach your child a second language is the same time she's learning her first one. Perhaps just English. I feel like it was sort of a waste of time to learn others. I hardly ever use it. I don't plan on putting my kids into the public school system. If I have any, I'll teach them at home by myself. If they really want to learn a language then I would teach them Japanese because it has more utility in 2013.