Anybody here study Spanish and have an introductory textbook they thought was particularly good? Not too cutesy, plenty of drill and vocab-from-context, clear grammar explanations
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There might be a side trip to Buenos Aires (I hope!) but part of the purpose of the trip is, I believe, to spend time with his family, who are in Chile. I know there'll be a few days in Mexico City as well, which Stephan's apparently fallen in love with just this past couple of weeks. (He spends an awful lot of vacations wandering around Latin America and South America, it's very jealousy-inducing.)
I have several Spanish texts leftover from my classes that I would be happy to give to you if you can use them!
My first two classes used Puntos de partida (6th edition) for which I still have the full lab book, most of the work book (missing pages from Chapters 7 through 12) and CDs for both. (They both have some sort of registration thing, though, and I need to check to make sure the content is accessable first.) As I remember, it was a fairly good introduction and just flipping through it there are a lot of examples and exercises for Spanish in conversation. This is also the largest of all the Spanish books I have and the only hardcover.
I also have Siempre adelante (2nd edition) which I don't remember that well. I bought it used so it has been marked up a bit and the lab manual I have that accompnies it is missing Chapters 1 through 5 and pretty much requires the lab material to be useful.
Then there is Punto y aparte which I think my last class used. It is similar to the first one just at a higher level. This one is pretty
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Hey, cool! I wasn't expecting any offers of actual textbooks, that's awesome. I may very well take you up on that! Is the Puntos de partida an introductory one? Or does it assume you've already had some Spanish? My brother's lent me an old textbook of his, but it's the second in a series and already assumes you know what the first book taught, so it's a bit tough to work with.
Puntos de partida looks introductory to me! It calls itself "An invitation to Spanish" and it was the text used for Spanish 101 and 102. It starts out with some simple phrases, basic vocabulaty and the alphabet and then moves right on in to ser and estar.
Also, as far as I can tell the CDs that go with it should work! Two of them need a little registration thing that I didn't really investigate and the third is simply audio files that could help with accent and stuff.
All right, I've officially (as of ten minutes ago) given up on trying to learn via semi-imersion from my brother's intermediate textbooks. If you'd be willing to dig up that Puntos de partida for me, I would be eternally grateful. What's your email these days?
Wow, you are really damn talented at languages. I only speak german and english, both my japanese and french skills are rather... decent (I learned french in school. I still totally fail at it) and can say one of two sentences in various other languages. But really speaking it? Wow. Respect!
Honestly, don't be too impressed with me. German is now by far my best language, and I'm not as good at speaking it as I am at writing it. I used to be as good at French, but I'm definitely not any more -- I can still understand it and read it okay, but I really can't speak it. And my Japanese is so elementary I can hardly count it. And then there are tiny, tiny scraps of Latin and Spanish. I don't remember any Hebrew any more, though I might still be able to sound out words if I was given a few decades to think about it.
So yeah. Honestly, pretty much just German. =P You're still far ahead of me!
Maybe it's just me, but I found spanish really hard to learn. :/ I was pretty good in Latin at school and would consider myself rather talented in languages, but when I started spanish that somehow did not help me at all and I totally failed at it. XD Although I had it 3 years in school I don't think I can even form more than 3 sentences anymore. Understanding is a little easier, or reading.
And I also think you won't get very far with "school spanish" in Chile. I am pretty sure they have an accent and it will be even harder to understand them. ^_^;;;
But I really don't want to discourage you! Just an opinion from someone who has tried and failed... XD If you want to give it a try, do it. ^^
No, I know, whatever I manage to learn this summer is unlikely to actually help me in Chile. This is honestly just for fun -- going to Chile gives me the excuse to try to relearn some of the Spanish I used to have (I studied it for a couple of years in elementary school), and there are so many kinds of music (and dance!) which I love that come from various Spanish-speaking cultures that I really want to learn it anyway.
I think in many ways modern Spanish overlaps more with English than with Latin, so that and French might give me more of a boost than the quarter-teaspoon of Latin I still remember.... I dunno, No harm in trying, right? =)
I do not have any Spanish text books. Also the Spanish spoken in South America varies from the Spanish in Central America. Yet, you know you may ask me anything you wish :)
As for "Kindly remove your hand from my ass" it is "Puedes, quitar tu mano de mi trasero (pompas, nalgas, culo ...) por favor?" ;)
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My first two classes used Puntos de partida (6th edition) for which I still have the full lab book, most of the work book (missing pages from Chapters 7 through 12) and CDs for both. (They both have some sort of registration thing, though, and I need to check to make sure the content is accessable first.)
As I remember, it was a fairly good introduction and just flipping through it there are a lot of examples and exercises for Spanish in conversation.
This is also the largest of all the Spanish books I have and the only hardcover.
I also have Siempre adelante (2nd edition) which I don't remember that well. I bought it used so it has been marked up a bit and the lab manual I have that accompnies it is missing Chapters 1 through 5 and pretty much requires the lab material to be useful.
Then there is Punto y aparte which I think my last class used. It is similar to the first one just at a higher level. This one is pretty ( ... )
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It starts out with some simple phrases, basic vocabulaty and the alphabet and then moves right on in to ser and estar.
Also, as far as I can tell the CDs that go with it should work! Two of them need a little registration thing that I didn't really investigate and the third is simply audio files that could help with accent and stuff.
Reply
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So yeah. Honestly, pretty much just German. =P You're still far ahead of me!
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I was pretty good in Latin at school and would consider myself rather talented in languages, but when I started spanish that somehow did not help me at all and I totally failed at it. XD
Although I had it 3 years in school I don't think I can even form more than 3 sentences anymore. Understanding is a little easier, or reading.
And I also think you won't get very far with "school spanish" in Chile. I am pretty sure they have an accent and it will be even harder to understand them. ^_^;;;
But I really don't want to discourage you! Just an opinion from someone who has tried and failed... XD
If you want to give it a try, do it. ^^
Reply
I think in many ways modern Spanish overlaps more with English than with Latin, so that and French might give me more of a boost than the quarter-teaspoon of Latin I still remember.... I dunno, No harm in trying, right? =)
Reply
As for "Kindly remove your hand from my ass" it is "Puedes, quitar tu mano de mi trasero (pompas, nalgas, culo ...) por favor?" ;)
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