Learning Spanish - One Year Later

My goal of learning Spanish continues after 1 year of using the Duolingo application, although it’s a love hat relationship at times.

There are things I like about how the Spanish language works.  For example dropping double letters in words or combining words into one word.  

On the other hand keeping track of word gender to change supporting words on either side of the gender word, can be frustrating.  Then add in if the word is plural changing the word in front and after to plural too, gets me mumbling.

Overall Duolingo is a good tool to learn Spanish.  I have nieces and granddaughter learning languages on Duolingo as well.  I do not pay for Duolingo, choosing to watch ads and earning points to move forward.

Recently, I was in Budapest, Hungry on travel and in a small underground shop I met a young lady who did well with English, and I knew nothing of Hungarian.  I shared I was learning Spanish using an app on my phone and she was too.  Yes we were both using Duolingo.  Small world.

This strategy has worked for me as I need the practice before moving on to ensure I have the logic right and recognize what right way of answering the questions.

Duolingo has tips that may not specifically address your mistake but tips are not often enough for me.  I needed rules early on and Duolingo doesn’t focus on rules.  For example when do you put El in front of Senor Perez.  Or when you use Usted.  This information in adavace of the lessons that use these examples would have saved me a lot of work.

The key for me in learning is practicing the lessons over and over again before moving on to the next lesson.  

What I like about Duolingo a lot is that I learn how to read, write, grammar, and listed to Spanish from the ground up and not just canned phrases.

As you can see I got the badge for my one years work.  Although I am not further along with completing lessons, what I’ve learned is securely in my brain.

Happy language learning.

Brent

macaloney@hotmail.com