Roy’s Comments (group member since Mar 28, 2012)

Roy’s comments from the Spanish Learning books group.

As mentioned elsewhere in the forum, slang is a crucial part of a truly useful language mastery.

I ran into this funny video series that employs heavy use of Argentinian slang and is relatively easy to follow due to the facts that everything's in text and the conversations are short.


The first episode of El amor en los tiempos del chat (Love in the times of chat) .

Thanks for sharing, Mexican Slang 101 is now on my to-read list.

Your comment on the importance of slang is spot on. The exploration of 2nd language slang is a life long endeavor, and its control is often the real test of one's control of the language. It's also among the few things that are better learned and practiced by reading comic books than by reading classic novels :)

Here's one for Kindle owners: A free Spanish to English dictionary for the kindle.

This dictionary is auto-generated, which has some upsides and some downsides:

The major benefit is that almost all conjugated forms have a translation, unlike other Spanish dictionaries available for the kindle.

The downside is that most entries are translated to a single word in English, without the context that regular dictionaries provide.

Thanks to this dictionary I've managed to tackle books in Spanish that are beyond my level. Highly recommended.

We could transform this idea to a forum thread: A weekly or daily passage from a book you're reading.

James wrote: "Not particularly for Spanish, but there's Anki, a spaced repetition flashcard program: http://ankisrs.net/ ."

Yep, seconded. Years ago I purchased a license for SuperMemo, which I think is the original software to use this algorithm. I use it for my Spanish and I find it invaluable. I think Anki is a better alternative all around, though.

Awesome free utility for writing accents on letters. The idea is simple: When the app is running, holding the caps lock key and clicking an accent-able letter will add an accent to it.

for example: caps lock+n = ñ

Spanish Accents CapsLock

Feel free to post here your favorite tools, tricks and apps that help you with Spanish in any way!

Amazon recently opened a Spanish eBooks section in their Kindle Store, giving us access to many popular books in Spanish.

While most of the books there aren't aimed at learners of the language, re-reading in Spanish a book you've already read in your native tongue can be a wonderful way to practice and gain confidence. Highly recommended to check out!

And if you don't own a kindle, this is just one more reason to get one :)

There are many ways to learn a language via reading. From a dual language book where every passage is presented in two languages, through a children or young adult literature, to reading a classic you're already familiar with and simply sucking in the language in its highest level.

What other methods do you use? Which way is your favorite?