improve my Spanish language skills

I’ve spent the my whole evening cleaning and listening to my new favorite radio station en espanol (I don’t know how it took me over a year to realize it’s the best one in the city!). Excellent. O, digo, excelente. I’m such a dork.

I was recently put on the spot to speak in Spanish and miserably failed. It was greatly frustrating… both discouraging and encouraging. I lost touch with my last language exchange partner, but I think I should investigate that option again.

I had to make some phone calls for work yesterday, requesting information from local businesses. Well, after the second call I realized that most of these places were not going to speak much English, if any. So I got to make several phone calls in Spanish and was forced to brush up on my skills very quickly. I’m sure it was obvious that I was not a native speaker but that I was trying my best… and that did the trick in most cases. There were a couple of times where people were not willing to give me the information I needed, but I really don’t know if I can attribute that to the language barrier or other factors. But either way, I got to use my Spanish at work, and (surprisingly) it didn’t fail me!

is my third language exchange session with a woman from Barcelona. The first time I felt very rusty, the second I felt more competent, and we’ll see how tonight goes. But it’s a start! I’m happy about that.

I was waiting for food at a Chinese restaurant and all they had to read was a giant stack of Spanish-language newspapers (go figure… you gotta love Chicago!). So I picked up a copy of Hoy and was pleasantly surprised to find that I could read it almost as if it were in English. Now, I guess I can only assume that because it’s an American newspaper, it’s written at about a 4th grade level, just like an English-language paper. But still, I could scan an article and know what it was about, or I could read it and understand at least 80* of the vocabulary.

This is a huge morale boost for me, as well as a bit of a telling sign that my comprehension skills are improving.

Well, I’ve barely attended my Spanish course because of the complete lack of energy I’ve got after work. I quit going the week I came down with mono, so it’s been almost a month. And I was going to go back this week, but my boss made me work late on Tuesday.

I think I’m going back next week. I should be able to handle it… and I really need to get back into the swing of things.

I received a phone call yesterday at work… a woman speaking Spanish who needed help. I understood most of what she said and was able to give her the information she needed. Victory for both of us :-)

Anyway, I’m making other potential strides to keep working on this goal. In addition to going back to class, tonight I’m going to submit my application to go back to school and finish my Bachelor’s degree in Spanish. I still don’t know if I’ll follow through with this, but if I want to keep it as an option, I need to be able to enroll in classes (upper-level Spanish classes fill up fast). So hopefully all of this information will be processed quickly and I’ll be allowed to register along with everyone else at the end of this month. Crazy. Loco.

I’m taking a conversational Spanish class once a week. It’s not anything huge, but I’m determined to become more deliberate in my speech and to study outside of class to help more with vocab and verb conjugation. I can feel myself improving within each individual session, and hopefully that improvement will move to session-to-session improvement.

In addition, I got some telenovelas on DVD for Christmas. Although I haven’t watched too many episodes yet, and I find that it’s a bit of a struggle to keep up, it’s been helpful. I also got an XM radio that has 4 Spanish-language stations. Although I crave Spanish rock and it seriously lacks in that department, I listen to it from time to time, and come across songs I actually enjoy on occasion.

All steps in the right direction.

And now I’m considering returning to school to finish my Spanish degree – both to have the degree AND to really hone my reading, writing, and speaking skills. It’d be a difficult task, jumping back into 400-level courses for a year, but it’s a definite consideration. If I don’t go back for Spanish, I think I’m going to finish my Master’s, and I’ve already got ideas of how to incorporate time in Latin America/Spanish-speaking opportunities with the program.

Que emocionante soy yo :-)

After the new year I’m going to find a Spanish class to take in the city. They’re all over the place, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find something. I hear Spanish all the time at work, but when it comes to actually speaking it I freeze up. I need to do this for myself – it’s not really necessary for my job, but it’s something I want. I freaking love the Spanish language.

There’s a new telenovela juvenil on Univision… and since I never got into the last one, this is my next chance to get back into watching tv en espanol more often!

I used to be fluent in spanish, but now i never have the opportunity to use it anymore. Anyone in the Pittsburgh want to practice?