Music is a fantastic way to study another language and increase your fluency. You learn new vocabulary including local slang, improve your pronunciation, immerse yourself in the culture, and best of all it’s fun! I find listening to Spanish music a really motivating way to begin a study session; music lifts my spirits and inspires me to carry on.
Our first post on Cheap & Useful Resources for Learning Spanish was written before we came to South America and since then we have learned a lot. Our approach to language learning has changed considerably, and we have discovered many more useful resources.
Our first Spanish resources post recommended Benny’s Fluent in 3 Months blog, and since then he has released the very useful Language Hacking Guide outlining his unconventional approach to language learning. The focus is on communicating in the language from Day 1 and it is packed with tips on exactly how to do this. The guide has become our Bible and is a huge inspiration. Many of the tips below originally came from Benny.
We English speakers are generally rubbish at learning languages –while Europeans (and Asians and Africans) often speak three, four or more languages we struggle with simply ordering a coffee in Paris.
Why is this?
There are many reasons – It’s hard to learn a language. We don’t have the time. We can’t afford a teacher or a language course. We have no one to practice with. Everyone in the world speaks English anyway.
The Language Hacking Guide shows you why all of these excuses are just that – excuses. It gives you all the advice and resources you need to stop procrastinating and start speaking.
In preparation for our South America journey we’ve been learning Spanish for the last six months. As we were saving for our trip we didn’t want to pay out for expensive classes (we’d rather spend the money on lessons here in Buenos Aires) so we used a number of free language learning resources. Most of these tips can apply to all languages, not just Spanish, so if you want to learn a language then why not give these a go?
Pimsleur is actually an expensive course to buy, but we borrowed ours from the local library. It’s a comprehensive audio-only course consisting of three levels each with 30 x 30 minute lessons, one per day. It’s very easy to fit the lessons into your life as you can listen to them while you commute to work, do the washing up, or walk the dog.
We are Simon Fairbairn & Erin McNeaney a couple who sold everything and left the UK in March 2010 to travel the world forever. We write about our travels and our journey to become digital nomads. Read more...