Become a Word Collector and Increase your Spanish Vocabulary
A problem that a lot of people have when trying to speak a foreign language is they don't have the vocabulary to say what they intend to say. I know that was a big problem for me, at least. Luckily there's something you can do about that. Become a word collector! Use your native tongue to your advantage. What I mean by this is look around you. What are some items in which you know the English word for, but you don't know the Spanish word for? Think of phrases you use all the time. Every single word you don't know in Spanish, write it down in a notebook. Listen to music, watch tv, read books, etc and find words that you dont know in Spanish. You'll notice that there are so many little words, like "moon, tissue, socks, fingernail, etc that you didn't even think of looking up. Look them up and study them. Keep this notebook with you at all times because every instance can produce another word that you need to find in Spanish. Also, if you're reading/listening/watching Spanish, write down every word that you had to look up with your native language. I, at the moment, have 33 pages front and back with 27 words per page that I have been collecting(a lot, huh). Make flash cards with these words, and study a set amount per week. I, personally, study about 5 pages front and back per week (270 words/phrases)since I have a good memory and an SRS program that helps me review vocab. You can do more or less based on your abilities and schedule. Basically, by being a word collector, you're learning new vocab as you did as a child. You picked up words from everything someone said, anything you saw, anything you read, or anything you heard. So, give it a try. Your list will be long. Mine is and I'm in my 5th year of Spanish. Don't get discouraged and feel like you'll never know every word in Spanish. First of all, no one knows every word in their mother tongue. Second of all, Spanish and English are pretty similar. There are plenty of cognates(though beware of false ones). If English(or any of the romance languages) is not your first language, you may have to work a bit harder, but in the process you'll help yourself with English and the Romance languages as well. Good luck to everyone in increasing your Spanish vocabulary!
4 Answers
Of course, using an SRS + physical flashcards is the standard way to learn a language. Without flashcards you will never learn all the words. For those curious, an SRS is a Spaced Repetition System. It is an electronic flashcard system that you use on your home computer. It is the friend of the polyglot and vital to language learning. For more information about Spaced Repetition go here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition. Everyone that is serious about learning a language is a word collector.
¡No te preocupes Seitheach! Seguir escribiendo en español. Aprenderás muy pronto. 
Gracias
(Heidita convinced me to answer in Spanish. I'm starting small.) 
Thats a great idea! Thanks!
