Cool Tricks to Memorize Spanish Words and Phrases?
Hi all, I am a sophomore in high school taking Spanish 3 and I was wondering if there were any easy tips and tricks that could help me memorize spanish words and phrases?
Thanks all in advance :D.
6 Answers
hang out with Spanish speakers
Little steps but often. Do a wee bit structure (grammar), & a wee bit vocab EVERY DAY. Learning a foreign language is like slinging mud at a wall. A little will stick every time, but most will fall off. You just need to keep slinging that mud. Think about the kinds of things you say every day. It might be what you say to a family member or friend. Commands are useful. Translate them & use the out aloud, even with folk who don't understand. Don't worry about grammar terms (you learnt your native language without knowing them), but understand who to form the language. By far the most successful tool is immersion. Get a Spanish-speaking friend or pen-pal. Don't worry about it & relax. ENJOY the learning experience...
write down the name of your furniture and belongings or whatever on the sticky paper and stick it to the object it is related to. like "la puerta" on your house door. it will remind you the word whenever you open/close the door.. Buena suerte.
I have been told that for a word to "stick" in your mind so that you can then use it you need around 20 exposures to the word. So in short there are no shortcuts.
Welcome to SpanishDict. You have some very good suggestions there. We also have many helpful resources here at SD. Taking advantage of these learning tools and joining in on the games provided in the "Games" section will help. Many members here get a lot of useful advice and practice from interaction with one another. If you have questions, please post those too. Good luck. 
Musis, music, music, I listen to NoThInG but Spanish music, kids songs are great. YouTube is great for finding music you like and you can make folders in your YouTube account to keep what you like, many songs you can search for will have the lyrics posted so you can sing along with them.
FlAsHcArDs are also wonderful. I've made a ton of flash cards I put the Spanish on one side and the English on the other. Learning phrases gives you more information for you c time and will help you start thinking in phrases rather than words. Such as...I have to get going...Tengo que irme....when using Flashcards you can test yourself in both directions...Read the English side see if you can say the Spanish side before looking and visa versa. You can purchase book rings they are in the stationary section of your store and punch a hole in one corner of your flashcards and keep them all on a ring so you don't loose any.
I have made a bunch of Flashcards at Cram.com, they have a free app that you can download to your iphone or android phone. Then you can go to the Cram site and search for Spanish and it will pull up a TON of flashcards you can study for free. You can download the ones you like to your phone and any time you have a few minutes you can study. It doesn’t require an internet connection the cards will be downloaded to your phone. If you would like to see my cards search for cashclan and it will pull up the ones I have made. You can search for whatever you are studying, such as Spanish Subjunctive Present Tense, or Spanish Pronouns, Adjectives…anything your heart desires. I don’t think there is any charge to download to your phone. I know you can study on the site for free. I purchased a lifetime membership for twenty dollars 12 or 13 years ago so I could make flashcards but it’s free to study.
If you are far enough to be reading, read, read, read…I’m reading Charlotte’s Web in Spanish, La teleraña de Carlota, and I’m making flashcards for that book at Cram as I go along. You can purchase a paperback copy for under ten dollars. I use a highlighter to mark what I want to remember. So many times I’m reading and I get that lightbulb moment…Öh…That’s how you say that” Reading really improves your ability.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papelucho Here is a link about another set of books I’m collecting and going to start reading when I finish La teleraña de Carlota. They are about an eight year old boy. I have found some free downloadable pdfs of these but haven’t had the time to print them out yet. It is an easy enough level to read since they were written for children. Keep your Highlighter and dictionary handy though since obviously we don’t have all the vocabulary words of a child raised in Chile.
Maybe if we had enough interest we could start a book club where we would all read the same book and discuss it once a week. I’m very OCD and ADD so even though I have a ton of good ideas I work better with some kind of accountability. Get a study buddy.
Do you have any Hispanic friends? If you don’t get some!!! I attend a Hispanic Church and most of my friends are now Spanish speaking as their first language. As a matter of fact this next year I’m going to have the opportunity to take an 11 year old girl to Guatemala and Mexico so she can meet her Grandparents on both sides of her family!!! I text in Spanish all the time.
You know how we always have conversations going around in our heads? (at least I do) See if you can change them to Spanish. If I can say something in Spanish I don’t say it in English, I spoke only Spanish (at least what I could) to my grandchildren. I remember years ago when my grand daughter was about three years old, we were going down the driveway when a cat crossed in front of me. I had very little Spanish at the time but said. Que dice gato…..you can’t imagine how proud I was when my little grand daughter buckled up in the back seat said…”Meow”
When I first started trying to use my Spanish I would say things like….Dónde are my keys…it gradually grew to…Dónde están my keys…and finally ¿Dónde están mis llaves? Using the few words I knew made them automatic and made it easier to add more to my vocabulary.
Good Luck, never give up. It’s s…l…o…w for me I’m in my 60’s and the ole grey matter slows down but I’m getter better every day!!1
