Mar 20
Scott Adams, of Dilbert Fame, provides a great motivator for learning Spanish.
Scott produces his daily comic strips in español.
Mar 13
It is easy to overlook the math when learning a new language. “What is the Math of language learning?” you ask.
Answer: The math of language learning is the geometric growth of vocabulary and the exponential growth of items such as verb conjugations. Continue reading »
Jan 27
Beginning the study of a new language is either difficult or boring. Beginning Spanish can be difficult and boring, too. Spanish can be a struggle or a joy, and the learning strategies that you employ during the first days of your language study are most important.
The first step you take in wading into the language are the most important because you need to build a rock-steady foundation. Continue reading »
Jan 11
You often hear the quip, “Learning languages is easy. If a two-year old can do it, why can’t you?”
Of course this misses the point. Actually, the perprtrator of this myth glosses over several truths with the attempt at humor. Too bad that this humor turns out to have a mean underbelly, a less-than-nice (subtle) set of implications.
Here are the problems with learning language as a two-year old does.
Continue reading »
Jan 10
Modern high school and college Spanish courses often use a textbook that comes with auxiliary audio and video materials.
Besides increasing the cost of the text book, these materials can add interest and computer interaction (not the same thing as real, person-to-person language interaction, though).
But, carrying these Language Learning CDs is bothersome, particularly when you leave the CD in the CD drive of the computer lab.
Continue reading »
