Today's Best Teaching Tools for Learning Conversational Spanish

A quiet revolution in language-learning methods has taken place. With today's teaching tools for learning conversational Spanish it is faster and cheaper than ever to learn a new language. And you learn it in usable form, so that you can understand and be understood right away. In this article the author explores the current methods and results, contrasting them with his own experiences in traditional classroom learning.

Most of us who are adults had to sit through the classroom experience of studying a foreign language in high school.  Very many came away with a negative impression of the experience - I certainly did!  I studied French and remember saying at the time that I could identify at least three separate forms of the French Language.

First was the form that the teacher spoke, second was the form written in the textbook and third was the form I presumed that they actually spoke in France!

Things have changed a great deal since then.  Technology, fast data processing and handling, as well as better teaching methods have made interactive-audio language-learning courses the preferred way to learn.

The learning approach is the natural conversational approach, very similar to the way you first learned English!  You learn a few words, begin to use them in basic conversation and gradually expand your vocabulary, range and scope.

And you learn to speak by listening to experts speak and then imitating them.  You learn by listening to digitally recorded high fidelity lessons spoken clearly by native speakers of the language you are learning.

You interact with these lessons, listening, speaking, repeating, following the lead of the instructor in interactive audio.  The teacher says, "Repeat after me." And you do, imitating the word or phrase. The teacher asks a question and you answer, then you hear the correct answer so you can verify that you got it right.

Excellent language-learning courses can now be bought on the Internet.  They can be downloaded 24/7 and can be put to use in minutes. The leading courses are (in descending order of preference) Rocket-Spanish, Learning Spanish Like Crazy, Fsi Spanish, Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone Spanish. All are excellent teaching tools for learning conversational Spanish.

Generally speaking the first three of these are strongly oriented towards everyday conversational Spanish and the latter two are more oriented towards formal structure and grammar.  Any of these teaching tools for learning conversational Spanish will help you learn Spanish fast and correctly. 

Rocket Spanish (the clear leader) and all the rest have a version that is fully digitally downloadable.  Basic prices are around $100. That means that you can use your credit card, get the learning program right now, and be learning conversational Spanish just minutes from now. 

Since the lessons are in digital format you can offload them to your iPod or other portable audio device.  You can also burn lessons to CD's, take the CD's with you and listen to them anywhere, on any CD player.

So the place and time of your lessons is completely under your control. The speed of your learning is also up to you.  You can go fast or slow.  You can repeat lessons as many times as you want.  And you know that you are hearing and learning proper pronunciation as well as meter, rhythm and intonation of delivery!

These teaching tools for learning conversational Spanish are yours. You have possession.  You can refer back to them to refresh your memory and brush up on your Spanish at any time.  You can even do this on the plane to Mexico City or in the car on the way to the bullfights in Tijuana!

When I got to Paris, France, for the first time (With two years of high school French and 9 semester hours of university credit in French) I quickly found that no one could understand a word I said! 

I understood written French at the time, so I had to write down what I wanted to say on a notepad and show it to someone to communicate! Then I would listen in wonder when they read what I had written out loud! I was desperately trying to learn how to say what I had written down, from how native speakers, perfect strangers to me, said it!

In contrast, when you use today's teaching tools for learning conversational Spanish, you will learn correct spoken Spanish first, and rapidly.  You will be able to understand and make yourself understood immediately! And your learning time will be a fraction of that required by other methods!

In retrospect, I only wish that these methods had been around when I was learning French and Spanish!!

by Jorge Chavez