A Spanish Language Success Story
One of my friends asked me a few months ago what was the best way to start learning Spanish. He chose me because as a language teacher and learner (see http://123-learnspanish.com) I have a lot of experience and knows what it takes to improve your level. I told him that the main thing was to put a lot of effort into his speaking and listening, and make sure that he understands how to pronounce words correctly, making sure that he can be fully understood so as to give him confidence in what he is saying is clear and concise.
He decided to start with an audio course, supplementing this with lots of speaking practice with three different language exchange partners, and a grammar book so he could understand the different constructions. He worked through the audio course in a relaxed way, had lots of fun speaking Spanish with people from South America and even enjoyed the grammar he was reading as this helped him truly understand the different constructions that he heard.
He has made some really amazing progress in a short space of time, and now he is freely conversing with his language partners in a way that he thought was going to take him months to attain.
The main thing to take away from this story is that he learned the type of Spanish that we use in every day conversations and he used his Spanish verbally with native speakers. Putting yourself out there and using your Spanish will see you make big improvements in your overall Spanish.