What's your main weakness in spanish?

[Trellum]

We all have weaknesses, even in our own language!  I am native Spanish speaker and sometimes I still get confused with a few things regarding my language, that's why I keep my Spanish grammar and orthography books nearby   Just in case I need to consult something.  Because knowing what your weaknesses are in the language you are learning or have already learnt actually makes you stronger   There is nothing to be ashamed or disappointed about!  We are all humans who make mistakes!

So tell me guys, what is your main weakness in Spanish?  Do you have more than one weakness in Spanish? What are you planning to do to improve that?  Do you have any plan?

[1honeybrown]

I think that my main weakness in regards to learning Spanish would have to be in, well...learning it.  Lol!  Meaning that I really need to buckle down and apply myself.  I want to be fluent so bad, but I'm not diving into my study of the language like I should every day.  I am waiting to turn that corner of getting past knowing some vocabulary, how to conjugate verbs, etc...and start really using the language.  I want to turn to Telemundo and not just catch a couple of words or phrases here and there.  I do realize that it is all up to me.  Time to turn my weakness into my strength!

[Peninha]

As I've learned on my own and on the go I think my main difficulty is the grammar and making a lot of orthographic mistakes. I think these faults will never go away until I study a Spanish grammar!

[polaroidsredwine]

Everything.

Naw, kidding.  I just have problems keeping up with staying fresh on my studies.  I took four years in school but haven't really devoted time to studying since.  It's kind of a shame since I still feel like I know so much, I'm just so rusty from letting it stagnate.

I think I need to go find some reader books so I can at least do that when I need to read a novel while waiting somewhere.

[wannalurnspanish]

Everything.

Naw, kidding. I just have problems keeping up with staying fresh on my studies.  I took four years in school but haven't really devoted time to studying since.  It's kind of a shame since I still feel like I know so much, I'm just so rusty from letting it stagnate.

I think I need to go find some reader books so I can at least do that when I need to read a novel while waiting somewhere.

I hear this. The clincher for me though is all those darn verb tenses. I don't know them (as in, was never taught them!) in English, so I have a lot of trouble knowing them in Spanish. I have a GREAT book on it, but it's one of those things that always gets pushed aside in lieu of other things that need to be done.

[Brianna Jay]

My main issue with Spanish is speaking it.  I understand it quite well and can even read it, but I can't seem to speak it in a way that makes sense lol.  I have trouble when it comes to the order of the words.  It's like you're speaking it backwards or in a different order.  You'll see this when you translate a sentence from Spanish to English and vice versa.  The sentence will not make sense with EXACT translation.  So, I'm working on learning to speak it fluently.

[TheJamal]

My biggest weakness is the pronunciation. The only teacher i've had was not a native spanish speaker in high school, so I don't really have a great basis for pronunciation. I feel like learning proper pronunciation requires being immersed in the culture.

[limon]

I've lived in an English speaking country for two decades now, so I don't speak Spanish every day like I used to.

So my main weakness is definitely vocabulary. There are words I've simply forgotten, and others that were not known to me when I moved as a young adult. What is the word for mortgage, spark plug, or a rotator cuff injury in Spanish? I dunno, it never came up when I was a teenager!

[LivetoErr]

For me, it's sentence building. I have a pretty extensive Spanish vocabulary but, I simply cannot put the words together (to form more than a basic sentence). I, also, have a very hard time hearing what native Spanish speakers are saying. Unless they speak VERY slowly, I'm lost a few words in. Thank god learning a language when you're a child didn't seem this hard. I'm sure a lot of us would give up!

[Linguetronix]

Definitely listening skills. Along with that, I should also say I have a bit of trouble conjugating the verbs in the two thousand forms that there are, unlike English.

[Trellum]

For me, it's sentence building. I have a pretty extensive Spanish vocabulary but, I simply cannot put the words together (to form more than a basic sentence). I, also, have a very hard time hearing what native Spanish speakers are saying. Unless they speak VERY slowly, I'm lost a few words in. Thank god learning a language when you're a child didn't seem this hard. I'm sure a lot of us would give up!

Hi there!  I know what you mean!  Sometimes you seem to have all the right words, at least enough to form a sentence, but for some reason you just can't find the right order.  I never felt this way about English, but I definitely feel this way with dutch... I just can't seem to figure out the word order of this language!  So for an English speaker must also be hard to do this in Spanish.

[Trellum]

My biggest weakness is the pronunciation. The only teacher i've had was not a native spanish speaker in high school, so I don't really have a great basis for pronunciation. I feel like learning proper pronunciation requires being immersed in the culture.

Yeah, pronunciation seems to be the hardest part for most people learning Spanish, specially Spanish!  Fortunately we  don't mind that much about it, as long as the word yo are trying to pronounce sounds very similar to the way we pronounce it, so we can understand you! We don't look down on people who pronounces Spanish funny, unlike they do in some English speaking countries I have visited.

Sorry to hear your Spanish speaker wasn't a native!  I have never understood why school allow people teach a language that isn't even the person's mother tongue.

[rgaz83]

I hear this. The clincher for me though is all those darn verb tenses. I don't know them (as in, was never taught them!) in English, so I have a lot of trouble knowing them in Spanish. I have a GREAT book on it, but it's one of those things that always gets pushed aside in lieu of other things that need to be done.

I totally agree with this. I was never taught the verb tenses for English either. We barely learned the difference between an adverb and an adjective. Actually, I think Schoolhouse Rock taught me more about grammar than school did.

However, even if I have trouble with some of the verb conjugation, I think my main weakness is vocabulary. I need to buckle down and study more, but I get really frustrated when so many words just don't seem to stick, even after repeated study.

[Trellum]

I think that my main weakness in regards to learning Spanish would have to be in, well...learning it.  Lol!  Meaning that I really need to buckle down and apply myself.  I want to be fluent so bad, but I'm not diving into my study of the language like I should every day.  I am waiting to turn that corner of getting past knowing some vocabulary, how to conjugate verbs, etc...and start really using the language.  I want to turn to Telemundo and not just catch a couple of words or phrases here and there.  I do realize that it is all up to me.  Time to turn my weakness into my strength!

Same here with dutch. I really want to learn the darn language, but for some reason I tend to put it off for later, then in the end another week has just passed and haven't learnt anything new!  Jeez!  Most of the time motivation is the main issue when learning a new language.  Have you thought very well why you are trying to learn Spanish?

Sometimes thinking of that helps!  I try to think about my reason to learn dutch, I feel a bit guilty,  but at the same time I feel a bit more pressed to get to work and do it.  I might start studying it again once I get enough time.

[Trellum]

As I've learned on my own and on the go I think my main difficulty is the grammar and making a lot of orthographic mistakes. I think these faults will never go away until I study a Spanish grammar!

Portuguese is so similar to Spanish that you guys tend to write a lot words in Spanish the way you would in Portuguese.  I know what you mean   I've seen that happening quite a lot in the past, but don't worry, it also happens to Spanish speakers trying to write in Portuguese.  It's kinda funny!  Our languages are so similar that we think we already know them perfectly, but we have the orthographic and grammatical barrier.

I understand most of what I read in Portuguese, but I'd not be able to form my own sentences.  Tricky, isn't it?

[Trellum]

My main issue with Spanish is speaking it.  I understand it quite well and can even read it, but I can't seem to speak it in a way that makes sense lol.  I have trouble when it comes to the order of the words.  It's like you're speaking it backwards or in a different order.  You'll see this when you translate a sentence from Spanish to English and vice versa.  The sentence will not make sense with EXACT translation.  So, I'm working on learning to speak it fluently.

Hahaha, yeah, I know what you mean.  I actually feel blessed when I started speaking English because for some reason the word order wasn't so troublesome to me.  Sadly now I really need to learn dutch, but the word order in dutch is truly troublesome for me!  I guess it's the same thing for people trying to learn Spanish, because our word order might not make sense to you, the word order in dutch doesn't make any sense to me either.

As you said there are no exact translations, and Spanish is a language with a lot colloquial slang and so on.  So you really learn those by memory if you want to be fluent in it.

[Trellum]

I've lived in an English speaking country for two decades now, so I don't speak Spanish every day like I used to.

So my main weakness is definitely vocabulary. There are words I've simply forgotten, and others that were not known to me when I moved as a young adult. What is the word for mortgage, spark plug, or a rotator cuff injury in Spanish? I dunno, it never came up when I was a teenager!

I hear ya!  I met a girl who had been living in Norway since she was 13 years old, so she was usually at a loss of words whenever we spoke.  Poor girl, she tried to do her best, but she couldn't keep up with me; a girl who had been speaking Spanish her whole life every single day.  Needless to say we didn't talk that much.  We had a lot awkward silences... eeek!

[sevvy]

As somebody who is used to speaking in English and learning French, I find the words in Spanish to be quite difficult to spell. I have a tough time figuring out where to pluralize my words, which letters should be double, etcetera. In my opinion, the grammar isn't actually that hard to learn! It's just the vocabulary that is difficult to master, as it is for most other languages in my opinion.

[TimT90]

I would have to say may greatest weakness in learning Spanish, is trying to speak it like I would English.

I get very confused at times when I'm translating a sentence & then (to me) it seems like a word is out of place. Then I have to go back & figure out the actual meaning behind what's being said, rather than the literal translation itself.

[Poki]

I have to say it is the grammar aspect. Personally, I find it a bit tedious to include accent marks in informal emails. Hopefully, I will get over this slump and actually try - it's really actually necessary to be taken seriously.

[Determined2014]

I have a hard time with the pronounciation at times, where an alphabet is to be silent I end up pronouncing it, that is my big problem.-

[Trellum]

As somebody who is used to speaking in English and learning French, I find the words in Spanish to be quite difficult to spell. I have a tough time figuring out where to pluralize my words, which letters should be double, etcetera. In my opinion, the grammar isn't actually that hard to learn! It's just the vocabulary that is difficult to master, as it is for most other languages in my opinion.

Yeah, I agree with you.  As a Spanish speaker there are words that are a bit difficult to spell right, specially when it comes to the genre.  There are nouns that give you no clue what their actual gender is, not so long ago I thought ''Sartén'' was masculine,  but in fact is feminine!  My mother told me once that is: ''La sartén'' and not ''el sartén''.

Spanish is a tough language to learn, getting the genre of words right is truly tough! 

[Trellum]

:vampire:

I have to say it is the grammar aspect. Personally, I find it a bit tedious to include accent marks in informal emails. Hopefully, I will get over this slump and actually try - it's really actually necessary to be taken seriously.

Tell me about it, a lot Spanish native speakers where I live rarely include those accent marks, yes, not even when they are working on their homework!  Our language is being destroyed by those people, they make so many orthographic and grammatical mistakes it's ridiculous.  But I guess our teachers can't check every single word to see if the accent marks are where they are supposed to be.  It's tough to be a teacher, ask my mother!

So don't worry, even native speakers have issues with this, just keep on trying until you get it right.  I still forget where some accent marks go from time to time, heh!

[Trellum]

I would have to say may greatest weakness in learning Spanish, is trying to speak it like I would English.

I get very confused at times when I'm translating a sentence & then (to me) it seems like a word is out of place. Then I have to go back & figure out the actual meaning behind what's being said, rather than the literal translation itself.

Yeah, I know very well what you are talking about, because at first I also had such a hard time trying to guess what the right word order was.  I learnt a little neat trick to check whether the word order of a sentence was right or not. Sometimes it's really hard to know, specially in English, but in Spanish it must be more confusing!  I can see why this is one of our weaknesses.

[FosterTXT]

When it comes to Spanish, my pronunciation is my weakest point. Sometimes I have a bit of a hard time pronouncing some Spanish words correctly simply because they require a certain dialect and technique. I have been getting better though, with a bit more practice I am sure that I will be ok.