The BEST WAY To Learn Spanish With YouTube
So whenever I do videos speaking only in Spanish…
Beginners always ask how this will help them if they can’t understand a thing.
I understand the frustration and the confusion.
But it’s not their fault.
The book The Loom of Language says there are three steps in language learning: 1 – spoken, 2 – reading, – 3 writing.
Language is taught backward in School: 1 – written, 2 – reading, 3 – spoken.
This makes language learning virtually impossible.
This leads to nothing but frustrations and little progress.
So let’s simplify everything…
In reality, the only way to acquire Spanish is to CONSUME Spanish…
Not studying grammar, not memorizing vocabulary words, and not learning conjugations.
But again, that brings the question, well, how do we consume Spanish if we can’t understand Spanish?
The goal of this article will be to show you how to do that…
And even better, it will be to show you how to do that with YouTube.
This is great because YouTube is 100% FREE.
Of course, you could invest a little money in different tools and programs and stuff to help accelerate your learning…
But that’s a topic for another time.
Watch the video below and I will walk you through the best way (skip to 1:57).
The Best Resources To Use
You can use my videos where I speak ONLY in Spanish.
You can easily find those videos on my YouTube channel by going to the videos.
Any video with the CC by it means it has subtitles.
But don’t just watch my channel.
Watch other channels and videos too.
Find things that entertain you.
Try to find a Vlogger or a documentary-style channel.
Remember that whatever content you choose, try to make sure it is content that speaks the type of Spanish you want to learn.
If you want to learn Puerto Rican Spanish, find content from Puerto Rican Spanish Speakers…
Don’t spend day after day consuming Mexican or Spain Spanish.
Or vice versa…
If you want to learn Spain Spanish, find some great channels that speak that type of Spanish.
How To Use Spanish Transcripts For Video
Before you watch any piece of content…
The first thing you should do is read the Spanish transcript.
It’s great when you have this 2-columned “translated” text because it saves time (See video above).
You can read the script in Spanish…
And any time you pass a word or phrase you don’t know, you can highlight it in both columns.
Then you go back and write down all the phrases you highlighted.
You should spend a decent amount of time with the transcript until you can understand most of it.
I’ll explain why that’s important in a second…
But make sure you do this before you start consuming the content.
A Big Mistake Most People Make
Depending on your current skill level, you may just be able to glance through the script…
But if you’re just getting started, you will have to go through it a few times…
And that’s okay…
Sometimes we have to go slow, to go fast.
It’s more important to do this than just consume Spanish without knowing what’s being said.
That’s a common misconception that people have.
They believe that if they just listen to Spanish all day, they will become fluent.
But to acquire the language, one has to understand the majority of what they are consuming…
And that’s pretty difficult to do when you are just getting started.
That’s why we are studying the scripts and doing the hard work now.
What this does is help us make the “input” comprehensible.
80% Comprehension Needed
You can’t learn Spanish without consuming it.
But to learn it when consuming it, you have to understand what you are consuming.
That’s what this does…
It allows you to know what the content is about, learn words you don’t know, and overall make your input comprehensible.
As your skill level improves, you won’t need to spend as much time doing this.
That’s when you are reaching higher levels.
You’ll then be able to spend less time with the scripts.
The goal with any piece of Spanish content that you consume is to understand about 80% or more of it.
For example, if you read the first 100 words of the script and only understand 20 of them, that would be 20% comprehension.
This means you need to spend more time with this script until you can understand at least 80% of it.
Does that make sense?
It might seem like a tedious task…
But you will be surprised to see how fast your skill level improves.
In just a few months, maybe even weeks, you won’t even need to do this anymore…
All you will need to do is watch the videos with the Spanish subtitles.
Then you would just write down the words you don’t know…
And study them with Spaced Repetition to help ingrain them into your brain.
As you progress, you won’t even need to do that.
You will reach a point where you can understand everything by just listening.
This is when you know you are reaching the highest levels.
If you are really looking to take your Spanish to the next level, then check out our FREE 3 Secrets To learn Spanish faster training, where I will show you my 3 most significant secrets to become fluent in Spanish faster.
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