What I’ve learned in SPANISH 101 & 102
As I’m learning Spanish, some of the challenges that I’ve faced are pronouncing the words correctly and putting the accents in the right places. Some success that I’ve come across is understanding the words I know and pronouncing the words that I’m comfortable with. The strategies that I’ve used to help me study for tests and other things I have trouble with in Spanish, are practicing the words I don’t understand, and reading everything over to myself until I do understand it. Another thing I usually do is read off everything on the study guide with my mom(who speaks Spanish), So I know what I would need to fix when I practice alone.
My learning method
I have the easiest method, in my opinion, I divided the language into a few different parts. I started with learning the main vocabulary and the alphabet. This was the easy part, I learned the basics very fast, Spanish alphabet is quite easy, since it’s so similar to the English language, and there. The vocabulary I was taught Were:
- Greetings (Hello, How are you, etc. )
- Describing our house and furniture (Hall, kitchen, room, etc. )
- Describing a person features (Tall, short, hair color, eye color, etc. )
- Describing our family tree (Mother, father, siblings)
- Describing our hobbies (sports, art, music, etc. )
- Being able to talk about our likes and dislikes
- Describing our education and plans
- Numbers (0-100)
After I learned these few necessary things, I decided it was time for the next part which is the grammar part of the language.
The grammar topics I learnt.
- Nouns (Masculine or feminine)
- Definite and indefinite articles (El, La) (Un, Una)
- Plural forms
- Regular verbs
- Irregular verbs
- Simple present tense
- Adjectives
- Simple adverbs
- Days of the week and numbers
Now it was important for me to realize that some words or phrases used or spoken in English could be defined entirely differently if spoken in Spanish. For example, the word me in English means exactly what it says, but in Spanish, me could mean I, my, or me. The sounds, blending, and usage of words played a major part in the correct pronunciation and understanding of Spanish speech. It was very common for the sounds of words to blend together.
In Spanish, the vowels’ sound is generally more distinct than in English. Spanish constants are generally softer and somewhat less distinct. As an English speaker, pronouncing the r/rr was probably the most difficult problem of my experience in learning Spanish. For example, the word pero means but, and the word perro means dog. If you use the words wrong, it would not make sense in the Spanish language. Moreover, this language has a few unfamiliar sounds and patterns that were difficult for me to get used to but I’m still learning.
This is an introductory assignment I worked on for the class
What I’ve learned in SPAN 102
This course helped me to continually learn communication skills in Spanish while exploring the products, practices, and perspectives of Hispanic cultures.
- understanding Spanish speakers when they talk about: themselves, their friends and families, their activities, interests, daily routines, jobs, classes, plans for the future, and references to the past.
- talk to native speakers of Spanish about the above topics, in phrases and sentences, referring to different time frames. I wrote basic compositions in simple but complete sentences and paragraphs. read notebook texts dealing with cultural products.
- recognize and compare similarities and differences between my own culture and Hispanic cultures. I recognized and appreciate the value of learning to communicate in more than one language and knowing about other cultures.