Fatal Spanish learning mistakes & how to avoid them – Episode 024

Fatal Spanish learning mistakes & how to avoid them

Podcast episode 24 – SEE ALL EPISODES

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

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Today I give you the top 3 language learning mistakes.

Today’s question comes from Leo, one of my Tw followers. Leo sent me a message saying: “What are the top Spanish learning mistakes you see your students making? I’ve been learning Spanish for about a year now, and I’m sure I’m making some big mistakes, because I’m not seeing much progress.”

I’m glad I got this question from Leo. I was in the same place when I first started learning English. Progress was-so-painfully-slow. Sometimes I still wonder how I ever managed to keep going. It was sooo boring.

See also: Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses.

But, I eventually figured out what I was doing wrong. And I’m going to give you what I think are the top 3 Spanish learning mistakes, so you don’t waste as much time as I did.

Spanish learning mistakes: Mistake 1

Mistake number one is to rush through the first few lessons in your Spanish course. If you’ve done some Spanish in the past, this is a real temptation. You start your course, look at the first few lessons, decide that you know most of the content, skim it, and then start on lesson 10 or even 20.

A few days later, you start to get lost. You can hardly do the drills, and the recordings in your course don’t make much sense. So you start to hate the course, and the temptation to give up sets in, because you feel your Spanish course isn’t good enough. Instead, what you should do is go back to lesson 1. However easy it may be. Even if you know all the words and can get all the drills right. There’s always going to be a phrase or a sentence here and there you’re less familiar with.

The secret to fast and consistent progress when you’re learning a language, is to know the basics really well. Without a solid basic knowledge, you’ll soon get lost and frustrated, and it won’t be too long before you give up.

Spanish learning mistakes: Mistake 2

The second mistake I see my students make is to ignore the pronunciation. Most Spanish sounds are straightforward, but that doesn’t mean they’re easy. You need to practice your Spanish pronunciation for two main reasons: so native speakers can understand you, and so you can understand native speakers.

Having a strong English accent makes Spanish very difficult to understand. You need to improve your accent, and you need to do it regularly, and with good pronunciation exercises.

Have a look at
Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses

Developing a good Spanish accent also helps you understand native speakers better, because you know what sounds to expect. That’s why a good Spanish pronunciation course will do wonders for your conversation skills.

Having a good accent is incredibly motivating, and a huge confidence booster.

Spanish learning mistakes: Mistake 3

The third big mistake I’ve seen my students make is to learn some grammar topics too early. I’ve had students at a beginner’s level spending hours of their time learning the verbs in all tenses, only to forget them a week later.

Grammar has to be learned gradually and naturally. The easiest way to learn the Spanish verbs is by focusing on the different tenses as they’re introduced in the conversations in your course. That means you won’t be learning some tenses for many months, but that’s OK. When you eventually tackle them, you won’t be wasting your precious time.

There other mistakes language learners make, specially at the beginning, but these are the main three.

Spanish learning mistakes: recap

To recap, let’s go through them again.

Number one is to rush through your first Spanish lessons
Number two is to ignore the pronunciation
And number three is to learn some grammar topics too early

Have a look at
Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses

Did you know that the majority of the people who start learning a foreign language never reach even an intermediate level? Don’t be one of them. Avoid these three mistakes, and you’ve got a much higher chance of succeeding.

Find out more about my Spanish courses.