<p>My 17 year old daughter would like to improve her Spanish over the summer. She has taken it in school through the honors 4 level. She is working several days a week and it will be difficult for her to attend classes. Do you have any suggestions for studying? Has anyone used tutors, self-study materials, etc. She is very social and I am afraid that self-study books would not be motivating. Thanks for any suggestions!</p>
<p>Does she drive to work? Perhaps she could listen to tapes (oh I am dating myself)–er record something in her IPod–in the car. Your local library probably has them and that is free.</p>
<p>Would you suggest classes on tape or do you mean materials such as books on tape? Do you think that watching Spanish movies and TV is a good idea or would more traditional structured learning be better? Thanks for the help.</p>
<p>There are all kinds of materials. If your library has CDs or tapes, she might see what looks interesting. My daughter checked out a German language movie and watched it without subtitles. Watching Spanish TV is a great idea. I always suggest TV to my community college second language students. That can help with pronunciation and sentence structure. Obviously, she can’t drive and watch those unless you have one of the new dashboard screens. Kidding of course. Depending on her level, she might find something to read. Magazines have shorter articles, so if she doesn’t have lots of time that might help.</p>
<p>Get a job in a local restaurant? (Learn from your co-workers).
I’m not kidding. That’s how S learned all the Spanish he knows.</p>
<p>That is really funny atomom. I don’t know the location of OP, but if she can talk to someone who speaks Spanish that is great. Of course, at the risk of sounding ignorant myself, you don’t always the education level of the people you are talking with. My daughter will also work some this summer for a friend of mine who is German and she is hoping that they will speak to each other mostly in German.</p>
<p>Thank you for the suggestions!</p>
<p>There are a lot of pretty cool free online practice opportunities and something called Lomas TV. Explore via google and you will be surprised at all the options</p>
<p>If you live in an area where there are Spanish speakers (which nowadays is most of the US) she can listen to Spanish-language radio and watch Spanish-language TV.</p>
<p>And Netflix has tons of movies in Spanish.</p>
<p>I’m not sure how advanced honors 4 level is, but if she has an interest in anything related to Latin America or Spain, then newspapers are a good way to develop reading skills, though it’s a difficult habit to upkeep if done purely for academic reasons. I follow Spanish football, so I watch for the headlines on the work of fiction also known as Marca, which probably doesn’t deserve to be called a newspaper - but the headlines aren’t the point, the language is.</p>
<p>Otherwise - music is excellent, since even if you don’t pay attention, some part of it works its way into your brain. The problem with tapes/auditory learning materials is that they aren’t one-size-fits-all, and it can be difficult to find a listening course that suits both her level and her preferred style of learning, but if she can find something that works, audio courses can be very effective.</p>
<p>Movies in Spanish are a great idea as well - or if you have movie DVDs with audio and subtitle options, she can set the audio to English and the subtitles to Spanish or vice versa, to practice reading/listening.</p>
<p>You could check with your library or other place that has ESL classes and see if a student would like to trade English practice for Spanish practice.</p>
<p>Very social is very good when it comes to language learning. If she can find someone, anyone, to speak Spanish with on a regular basis that is what I would recommend she do. The topic of the conversation really doesn’t matter, just so long as she has one. </p>
<p>Failing conversation with live human beings, she should watch TV or movies. Even better if she can watch them once or twice with the sound on, and then once or twice with Spanish captions so that she can double-check her understanding. If you get one of the Spanish-language networks where you live, she may be able to follow one of the Telenovelas for most of the summer. The plot lines are usually fairly predictable. And if she’s not put off by the various regional accents and country-specific slang they can be a lot of fun. True confession here: I mastered my Spanish by watching “Emperatriz” years ago in Caracas.</p>
<p>She should be able to stream some Spanish radio stations on her computer, too, if there isn’t one on the air in your area.</p>