Platiquemos Spanish review
I've
moved on to Platiquemos lesson 9, and I finally feel ready to review
the learning system --- five stars. Granted, I already know (or
ought to know) most of the grammar I've learned so far, but it's
completely different to know how to conjugate a verb versus to be able
to conjugate that verb on the fly in answer to a question. At
around an eighth of the way through the course, I'm still learning very
basic grammar and vocabulary, but I can tell I'll actually be able to
comprehend and reply using that grammar in the future.
I'm finally starting to
understand the Platiquemos teaching method, too, and I like it.
Each lesson is broken into around a dozen sections, two of which are
conversations, and the rest of which are drills. The drills are
carefully designed to let you hear the vocabulary and 
grammar from the
conversations in other contexts so that it really sticks. For
example, if you learned the phrase "Actually, the apartment ought to be
quite comfortable" in the first conversation, one of the drills will
force you to construct similar sentences (like "Actually, the kitchen
ought to be quite large") until the construction is ingrained in your
brain. This is the trick to learning rather than memorizing.
Pronunciation --- which gave me fits at
the beginning --- is no longer a problem. I can even (mostly)
figure out what's going on when Spanish speakers merge the last letter
of one word with the first letter of the next word, for example turning
"Donde esta?" into "Donde sta?" (Sorry to leave out the accents
--- they're a pain and I'm lazy.) My new struggle is with
speed. The first half dozen lessons are clearly recorded by
speakers told to speak slowly and clearly, but later lessons begin to
mix in more rapid speech. Hopefully in another eight lessons,
I'll be brushing off rapid-fire Spanish as no big deal.
I've settled on a
studying method that works to help me (a visual learner) comprehend the
lessons as quickly and well as possible. First, I spend an hour
poring over the written accompaniment to the lesson, trying to answer
the questions on my own (aloud), then checking the written
answers. This helps me understand where one word begins and
another ends and to think through the grammar before diving into the
much faster audio portion.
Next, I run through the
audio portion of the lesson, doing my best to speak the way I'm
supposed to. The first time I listen to the lesson, I sometimes
have to refer back to the written lesson several times to clarify
points I've forgotten. After that, I just work through the whole
audio lesson in one sitting, often while doing work that requires me to
use my hands but not my brain. I know I'm ready to move on to the
next lesson when I make no mistakes (or just stumble once or twice) on
the audio lesson, and when my mind begins to wander during the easier
parts. It usually takes me about four to six tries to get to this
stage.
At first, I was worried
that I might forget bits of earlier lessons as
I advanced, but the Platiquemos system includes a review drill in each
later lesson to make sure you haven't forgotten the basics. There
are even handy cultural notes and images peppering the text, giving you
tips on how not to flirt or insult someone accidentally, as well as
showcasing beautiful pre-Columbian artifacts. The music at the
end of each lesson varies from songs I enjoy singing along with to
those I flip past, but I guess it's also good for cultural immersion.
I would recommend
Platiquemos to anyone who likes to learn on their own and is willing to
commit a year or two to mastering Spanish really well. If you
want to learn a few catch phrases, though, this system is not for you.
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