Welkom

This is a cool idea, do you have a Duolingo account? I recommend posting it on the Discussion section of that forum

Find some Dutch TV shows where they talk at a conversational speed. Watch/listen to a couple of sentences, pause, go back to before the two sentences, turn subtitles on and see how close your translation was. Then listen to it once more with the correct translation to get a feel for the sounding of the words and a quick tempo. Remember you're not watching it for your enjoyment, so don't ruin a show you like :grin:

I am teaching myself Spanish using a few resources, I can't do video calls so have to do online lessons, here's what I use: https://www.duolingo.com/ - I do at least 100xp per day, including at least 5 lessons, in 31 days I have done 28 skills. https://livemocha.com/ - Useful for finding people to have conversation with, as well as this it has lessons that you can buy, you get currency by marking work done in your native language and then your work gets marked by native speakers of the language you're learning. http://www.gospeaky.com/home/ - Similar to livemocha, useful for finding people to talk to. On here you can also video call so people can help you with speaking and listening too. In my opinion, this is better than livemocha because it's more like a Facebook chat style. https://www.google.co.uk/#q=translate - Don't be afraid to translate words you don't understand, but be sure to try and work out the meaning first! Tips: Find a hobby you like and read news websites that revolve around that topic, mine is football, so I try to read Marca every day (http://www.marca.com/). DON'T sign up for websites that have 'free trials' but require payment afterwards. These are a waste of time as you only get the very basics before having to pay, which you can learn on free to use websites, you're just asking for spam emails. Get a Skype account if you don't have one already. A lot of people aren't always online on Livemocha or GoSpeaky, but they might be online on Skype. It's good for when those sites are down for maintenance too. Listen to music in Spanish. I listen to Enrique Iglesias most days now, his music isn't bad and his songs are quite slow, so it's easier to translate as you listen. Talk to people, they will help you understand the rules of the language. I'm sorry if this is too long and not what you were looking for :grin:

You have to find a language that will allow you to do what you want to do, from my experience. I tried learning Dutch, just because I wanted to learn a language. Using Duolingo, this is how far I got before giving up: Now I am learning Spanish because I want to study Journalism in Spain. This is a real aim for me now and I am taking it seriously. Again using Duolingo, this is how far I have gotten until now:

You were right, I edited it :grin:

Yeah, but it is pronounced as perculiar :angel:

I don't know if this will help and you've all probably tried it, but I'll sound the words out (how I say them anyway - as an Englishman) and hopefully that will get you to say them right. Yacht - Yot Fruit - Froot Conscientious - Con-she-en-shuss OddVisions - It's colour, it's our language, we're right. Peculiar - Per-cue-lee-er Rural - Rur-ral Teeth - I can't really help with this, start with the tip of your tongue on the roof of your mouth, just behind your teeth, then pushed off and move towards the front, when making the 'th' sound the tip of your tongue should be between your teeth. If that fails, just say teeff and people will think you're from London.

I have found 1,000 most common (with audio) - http://www.101languages.net/spanish/most-common-spanish-words/ or 5,000 most common (without audio) - http://www.memrise.com/course/737/first-5000-words-of-spanish-2/ I will look for more

Thanks Spanglish, I'll give it a try!

Thanks seankim and linguaholic. Yeah, I'm looking to learn it prior to going and can't really afford to go there beforehand for an extended period, I'll give Rype a try! Would you be able to tell me how much it is once I've used my free 30-minute lesson? I can't seem to find it on the website. I was also going to ask, what are good TV programmes/radio stations/music albums to listen to in order to progress my learning? I'm just gathering the basics together at the moment so am listening to artists with clear pronunciation, like Enrique Iglesias. I considered listening to some rap, but wasn't sure if this would work because in English rappers adjust pronunciation slightly to make things rhyme sometimes. Any more suggestions are very welcome, thanks!

Hi, I'm currently looking into the possibility of studying an undergraduate degree in Spain in a year/two, so thought I should try to learn Spanish prior to going, if I were to. I'm wondering what are the best and most efficient ways of learning Spanish? Currently I'm using Duolingo and am enjoying it thus far, I have used it before to learn Dutch but got bored, I feel this was because I had no real target but a degree abroad motivates me. I'm at a beginner level at the moment. Also, if anyone is from the UK and has studied in Spain I'd be very interested to hear what they have to say about it. Thanks!