To Speak Spanish
Hello people, I found a tandem partner, he's a native spanish speaker but here's the deal. I understand pretty much, sometimes even the complex sentences but I can't speak, because I've learned what I've learned by listening. I sometimes don't have any idea which verb they had just used or how to write what they've said. Someone says "vi" and I understand that it means "I saw" but mostly I don't have any idea the verb is actually "ver". So when it's about speaking I'm beginner maybe worse. Do you think tandem is a good solution for me? What shall we study?
2 Answers
Hello Ekim and welcome to the SpanishDict forum and website
I can understand your dilemma and I think alot depends on the kind of arrangement you have with your Spanish-speaking native and particularly his or her level of spoken English since you will need somone who can understand English well with at least an intermediate level of English or above.
If your partner is well able to understand your English most of the time and can encourage you to speak Spanish even at a basic level, while gently correcting your basic mistakes then hopefully that approach will help you to make progress.
In the mean time I would encourage you to join the Skype chats that are commonly held on saturday nights as they provide a wonderful way .to gradually improve your ability and confidence while at the same time having fun and making friends You would be most welcome but you will need to indicate your interest and availaibility
This week it will be about reflexive verbs You do not have to talk if you do not want to but you will need to send our chief administrator Heidita (English: Heidi) an
e-mail with your Skype nickname just in order to listen-in to the chat.If you would be interested in joining our chat either for this week or in the future I would encourage you to post a response to the Skype thread indicating your interest as anew member and Heidi will probably notice 
Here is a link to the Skype post: link text
I hope this helps :
How well can you read Spanish? When I was first starting I had the opposite problem. I practiced by reading out loud. I knew a lot of the theory, and I could speak it pretty well with a good accent, but I hadn't practiced listening, so I couldn't understand the answers.
I think you need to work through some basic lessons (here would be a good place to start) so that you learn verbs and their conjugations. Then you should just read out loud. I think online Spanish language newspapers are a good place to start. The vocabulary is somewhat limited, but it's a real world situation. In any case, it doesn't matter what you read, just read a lot, preferrably out loud.
