Learning words anywhere and everywhere

Hi,

In this blogpost I will write about learning words whereever you want! As you could read the title, I said: "anywhere and everywhere".
Yeah, this is true, you can. How? With a mobile phone. The best thing is you don't need a top notch mobile phone for this, for example that has an Android or Symbian operating system. You just have to download this software to your mobile phone and use it whenever you want to learn new words. To tell the truth, I have an old Sony Ericsson K510i mobile phone and I can run the English-Spanish translator software without any problems.

It can happen that is simply a bit frightening to sit down and learn words, because you can think that "oh, this will be boring" or you don't have just a few minutes.

Why to use a mobile translator?

1. The mobile phone is small and you can take it anywhere.
2. If you have to wait then you don't waste that time.
3. If you just started to learn Spanish, than you don't have to buy a dictionary(I have never had an English-Hungarian dictionary like Oxford or any bilingual ones, just free online and dictionaries for mobile phones).
4. Despite you can't use a computer or a dictionary because of something, you can search the words with ease.
5. Anytime you find a Spanish word that you do not understand, you can grab your phone and check its meaning or you can translate an English word too.

Probably there are more reasons to do this and if you will try this out,  I am sure that you will find those. :)

Post your thoughts via facebook or twitter.

Learning hundreds of Spanish words fast - part 1

Hi,

It seems that learning Linguistics at the university can be useful, haha:). The basic idea is that lots of English words is similar to Spanish words and the difference is always the same. I have found a rule while I have learnt Spanish(I'm sure that I'm not the first in finding this rule) and then I have did a research and couldn't really find irregularities. Okay... I could but then with anothe rule, I answered, why the irregularity exists in those words.

So let's begin:

• As I learnt, I have found something interesting
• Translating word after word the rule still existed
• I Found some irregularities but then I found the answer to my question
• Learnt lots of words without actually wanted to! ;)

The method:

1. Find an English word that ends with "tion" for example "option"
2. Change the "tion" ending to "ción" - option => opción
3. If you can add an "al" to the English word, if you can't, then it can be an irregularity It's like 100% that you can translate to Spanish with this method, check some words here: Google Translate
4. If you have found an irregularity, please post it here and help the Spanish learning community, thank you!

I hope this is helpful to you and don't forget, we appreciate your comments.

Have a nice day!

Spanish 101 - Safety - Level One

Hi,

The new Spanish 101 video has arrived and now this is about safety - seguridad. In this lesson you will learn some helpful words and phrases for safety like "doctor", "Where is the hospital?", etc. These words are a must if you go on a holiday or simply travel to a place where the majority speaks Spanish because you can't know when do you have to use these Spanish words or phrases (of course I hope you won't have to but prevention is better than cure). Furthermore, the pronunciation is way more important now, because they have to understand what you say immediately. So if you  want to travel to Spain or to Latin America, you should watch this video and memorize it. Have fun! :)

Spanish 101 - Safety - Level One

Spanish words and phrases in this episode of Spanish 101:

• Doctor - El médico
• Where is the doctor - ¿Dónde está el doctor?
• Where is the hospital? - ¿Dónde es el hospital?
• Where is the police station? - ¿Dónde está la oficina de policía?
• I am sick - Estoy enfermo(M)/Estoy enferma(F)
• Help - ¡Ayuda!

 Not that much but still important :) and don't forget, you can leave comments and mention other Spanish words and phrases, which might help others! Thank you!

Have a nice day!

A movie with Spanish dub - El secreto de sus ojos

Hi,

I have watched my first movie with Spanish dub and it was fantastic, the title is: "El secreto de sus ojos" or "Secret in Their Eyes", which came out in 2009 and has a brilliant score on IMDB. I liked the movie because it was completely unique and I have not seen a similar plot and ending but I did not have that "oh my god" feeling and mostly I watched it because it is in Spanish and my brother told that it is awesome.

When I started to watch it, it was quite odd that I could not understand fully what they say and I have to read the subtitle( not as I do with English or Hungarian dub:)) but I got used to it and after a few minutes I realized that I understand some words from the sentences and rarely some full basic sentences. I was so happy :D.

After all, I am happy because I learnt Spanish while I enjoyed a good movie.


Extra hint: Record 2-3 minutes from Spanish news, movies, radio talk, etc. and listen it and try to understand as much from it as you can, and do this till you can actually say the words before it comes in your recorded file.

Ensayo y la práctica idioma español (en español)

¡Hola!

Me llamo Gergő Gordos y soy de Hungría y Tengo  diecinueve años . Mi cumpleaños es el veintinueve de noviembre. Soy estudiante en la Universidad de Miskolc para ser intérprete o traductor pero no estoy seguro sí trabajare comó profesor de inglés. Lo malo sobre de la enseñanza es que es estresante. Yo soy alto y delgado. Tengo el pelo castaño y los ojos azul verdoso.

Me gusta Miskolc. Lo bueno de Miskolc es que hay muchas que hacer pero lo malo es que es ruidoso a veces. Vivo en las a fueras de Salgótarján  y me gusta porque es una zona verde.

Mi padre se llama Tamás Gordos. Tiene cincuenta y cuatro años. Es mecánico en la una fábrica. Mi madre se llama Mária Varga y trabaja en una empresa. Somos dos hermanos. Mi hermano mayor, Tamás estudia en la universidad de Miskolc también pero ser ecónomista. Mi hermano menor se llama Máté, es pequeño, tiene sólo nueve años y estudia en una buena escuela primaria. Tiene el pelo castaño y su cumpleaños es el nueve de julio.

Mis aficiones son salir con mis amigos, jugar al póquer y hacer deportes.

El trabajo de mis sueños es ser intérprete y tener una agencia de traducción. Quiero viajar porto todo el mundo y hablar idiomas.

Spanish 101 - Directions - Level One

Hello,

Here comes the next video from the Spanish 101 serie, it is about directions. As I did in the prevous videos I will summarize it again under the video. You will find the basics in this topic like What? Where? etc.

Enjoy!

Spanish 101 - Directions - Level One

• What? - ¿Que?
• Where? - ¿Dónde?
• Who? - ¿Quién?
• When? - ¿Cuándo?
• How? - ¿Cómo?
• Here - Aquí
• There - Allá
• Left - Izquierda
• Right - Derecha
• The hotel - El hotel
• Where is the hotel - ¿Dónde está el hotel?
• I want to go to the hotel - Quiero ir al hotel

Cone of learning

Hi,

I have just found an interesting picture about learning. As you can see it is about learning activities and learning outcomes. So it shows what % will you able to remember if you learn in this or that way. I was shocked because you will remember only 10% of what you read. It is almost nothing!

After checking out this cone I have thought a bit and now I know that when I have discussed a topic with somebody or did a presentation I have learnt that topic so easily! It seems I have to change my learning methods.

How about you? How do you learn?

Spanish 101 - Greetings - Level One

Hi,

I hope you enjoyed the first video that I have posted here. The next video will be about "Greetings" in Spanish. After the short video, I will summarize it again as I did it in my previous post.

Spanish 101 - Greetings - Level One video

Spanish words and phrases:

• Hello - Hola
• Goodbye - Adiós
• Good morning - Buenos Días
• Good afternoon - Buenas Tardes
• Good night - Buenas Noches
• How are you? - ¿Cómo está usted?
• Very well, and you? - ¿Muy bien, y usted?
• Please - Por favor
• Thank you - Gracias
• You are welcome - De nada
• See you later - Hasta luego
• It's nice to meet you - Mucho gusto
• What is your name?- ¿Cómo se llama usted?
• My name is... - Me llamo...

I wonder how much Spanish words have I posted to this blog, maybe I will count it, so you can know that how much Spanish words have you learnt so far. :)

Have a nice day!

Spanish 101 - Common Words & Phrases - Level One

Hey,

      I have found a great Spanish learning video serie. It's just the basics but I am sure that this will be pretty useful for most of you. You can find videos about dining, greetings, shopping, etc. All of these videos have 3 parts, level one, level two and the last is level three and of course a short Spanish Introduction video.

I think i will post these videos and summerize them so if you don't want to watch it again, just check those words and phrases below

Spanish 101 - Common Words & Phrases - Level One:

So, let's sum it up:

• I am (nationality) - Soy (nacionalidad), check your nationality in Spanish here
• I don't speak Spanish - No hablo Español
• Do you speak English - ¿Habla Inglés?
• I don't understand - No entiendo
• Excuse me - Perdón
• Please repeat - Repita por favor
• Where are you from - ¿De dónde es usted
• I am from (country) - Soy de (country)
• I speak a little Spanish - Yo hablo un poco  Español
• Yes - Sí, No - No
• Mrs - Señora, Miss - Señorita, Mister - Señor
• I'm sorry - Lo siento
• It's not necessary - No es necesario
• Of course - Claro
• Today - Hoy, Tomorrow - Mañana, Yesterday - Ayer
• Why? ¿Por que?
• Same here - Igualmente
• Maybe - Quiza
• How do you say in Spanish - ¿Cómo se dice en Español?
• Slower please - Mas despacio por favor

That's all for now, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Please feel free to comment and share your thoughts.

Mentality of learning

Now I am going to write a bit about the mentality that you need to create. Mentality in language learning is way more important than you might think. First of all, if you just want to learn a language at any cost but you hate it, you will simply struggle and you simply can't learn that language because you totally believe that it is impossible and you don't enjoy it at all. If you are here that it means you would like to learn Spanish and what is more important that you are interested in learning Spanish.

Furthermore, you have to find reasons why you need this language and it's even better if you write it down and read it recently. By the way, you should create an excel file about your goals like I will learn 100-500 words in March or I will learn grammar. It is ought to be detailed what you want to achieve and if you achieved just tick it. Just imagine it, if you can check your progress and you can see a lot of achieved goals then you will be proud of yourself and it will motivate you and the learning will be even easier.

Be positive! Just stop saying that you can't learn this or that language! Say that you can learn it and believe it that you can learn it!

 And finally a really truthful quote from Thomas Edison:
"Genius was 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration."

I wish you enjoyed reading this and please feel free to comment!

Improving Spanish by doing your daily routine

Hi,
In this blog post you won't find any Spanish word or Spanish grammar, I promise.

If you want to learn a new language you have to contact with it as much as you can.

Where?

1. news(papers)
2. TV
3. radio
4. Internet
5. movies
6. games
7. music
8. anything... Really, if you can find something in your native language then you can find it in Spanish almost always.

If you want to read  news in Spanish, you find some sites here or if you simply surf on the Internet just try to select Spanish language instead of English, French, German or whatever you use daily. Furthermore, if you want to watch a movie then watch it with Spanish subtitles or audio. Music? Yes. All people love music, and I bet you can find a  band who sings in Spanish that you will like. Well, if you like rock music then I think you will enjoy Ill Niño.If you hate rock music just try this song. Last but not least, games. If you play computer games then try to play it in Spanish. Most of the time you can understand a lot of things without understanding the language itself. Uh, that sentence was a bit odd but it's true.

Let's learn some words: Insects

Hi, as I said few days ago, now I am going to write some words in the topic of insects. Also I have "uploaded" a great starting book that I have started to use too because while we learn these words we ought to learn the Spanish grammar too.

Inglés - Español

insects - insectos

bee - abeja: If you now the game Oddworld, then this will be really easy again, but if you don't then click on the link and in my opinion it's quite hard to forget this "guy". Just combine with a bee on his nose or something like that.
hornet - avispón: You can connect it to the avispón =>spoon.
ladybug - mariquita: This and the butterfly were quite easy for me because I could connect it to my mother's name and imagine it really really easily, but if you don't have any friends or relatives called: Maria, then finding a famous person might be a solution or you can also connect it to chiquita.
butterfly - mariposa: Same
ant - hormiga: You can connect it to horn or the mig aeroplane .


As I have said a lot of times these imaginations should be funny, absurd, lots of movement in it. Please note that those things that I have mentioned so far for words are just hints and not the only way to learn these words. There is always a better alternative method, so please feel free to learn it differently if you find out a better solution :).


Task:
Try to find another 5-10 words and imagine it alone. 
p.s. If you would like to share it, you can do it under this post.

Let's learn some words: Animals 2

Hi again,
             this is the second word package, which is related to animals. I hope by the time you read this post, you can use the learning technique that I have mentioned in my second post. If you can use it then nothing can stop you from learning these new words in a really short period of time but if you can't, then just check it again ;)! I think I will write every animal that I have just memorised and of course I will give you hints too, but not for all, because you need to "do some words for yourself". . You simply have to learn to do it by yourself too. Maybe that was a bit rude from me, but I can't be there always if you learn a new Spanish word to tell that you have to imagine this and imagine that and then how to combine it. :) Let's get it started!

English - Spanish
animals - animales

cat - gato: gato - "o" and +  "e" =gate , imagine that a cat is jumping on a gate
fox - zorro: that's all, impossible to forget
fish - pez: no need to change the Spanish word, pez like the candy, imagine a fish shaped pez

goat - cabra: easy one, Chupa(cabra), ready... next one :)
frog - rana: just imagine a running frog like this, well, okay... I know that this is a dancing frog but you still can't forget it :D
monkey - mono: another easy one, imagine this monkey in a TV while he is pointing one the mono sound
chicken - pollo: pollo - "l"= polo, and imagine a chicken who plays polo
owl - búho: you can find a litte similiarity between the Spanish word and what the owl "says"

Okay, that's all for now. I'm pretty tired now so I think I'm going to sleep.:) Just go on in the same way with the following words.

dog - perro
horse - caballo
rabbit - conejo
bear - oso
stork - cigüeña
deer - ciervo
pig - cerdo
pigeon - paloma
squirrel - ardilla
wolf - lobo
bull - toro
beaver - castor
rhino - rinoceronte
goose - ganso
shark - tiburón
turtle - tortuga
pheasant - faisán

In my next post I will write some insects or insectos. Maybe this is quite odd for you and you might ask this question: " Why do I learn these words instead of the Hi(Hola), How are you(¿Qué tal? ¿ Cómo estás?), Good day(¡Buenos días!), etc.". The answer is easy. These words are perfect for practicing the word learning technique and if you learn it now, then every word will be easier.


If you want to chill out a bit, you can play game(s) here, if you like computer games or just simply go outside for a walk or do some exercises or whatever you would like to do:). Have fun!

Let's learn some words: Animals

Okay, just start with some simple and easy words, which you can learn instantly. These words have only a little difference or maybe nothing: You can learn the Spanish pronunciation here.

English - Spanish
animals - animales
jaguar - jaguar
lion - león
zebra - cebra
giraffe - jirafa
gorilla - gorila
penguin - pingüino
tiger - tigre
leopard - leopardo
serpent - serpiente
crocodile - cocodrilo 
dolphin - delfín
hippopotamus - hipopótamo
mouse - ratón
rat - rata
hyena - hiena
camel - camello
panda - panda
elephant - elefant
kangaroo - canguro

How to learn the words easily

Hi, here is a really easy and effective technique to learn foreign words.
The technique based on the mind control(Silva method). There are lots of words, which you can connect to something. For example: "pen" is "pluma" in Spanish. So you have to connect these two words somehow.

a.) pen - pluma
Step 1: Close your eyes
Step 2: Breath deaply few times and relax a bit(you should do this when you start the learning but of course you can repeat this anytime)
Step 3: Imagine the English word, now it's "pen".
Step 4: Now we just need to find something in the foreign word. "Pluma", just forget about the "a" and that's it! It's the "plum" the fruit.
Step 5: Here is the final step, imagine the two words in one picture. For example: the pen is stabbed through the plum or anything else, which is the most suitable for you.
b.) duck - pato
Step 1 and 2: Are the same as before.
Step 3: Imagine the English word, now it's "duck" It's really important how you imagine it. Just think about it and check these images. duck 1 , duck 2(psy duck from Pokemon). Which is the one that you can remember more easily? I bet the second one:)!
Step 4: Same as before. Pato, minus "o" and add an "h". "Path".
Step 5: Combine them. Check these pictures and choose one if you need it.

The first 5-10 words might be a bit odd to learn in this way(it will be easier and more natural if you practice it daily) but if you do it as I said, you simply can't forget these words.

Bio, plans, blogging scheme

Hello,

I'm going to write about my spanish learning journey, for example learning techniques, words, grammar. I'm starting from 0 Spanish knowledge because in the first semester I barely learnt anything, which is related to Spanish :). Hopefully my English will improve too.

So, my plan is quite simple: B2 level(CEFR) in a half or maximum 1 year. Mostly by self-taught.

 Blogging scheme: I am going to regurarly update my blog and  post those things, which I have learnt and how do I learnt those things. Furthermore, I am going to show some language learning techniques and the connection of mentality and language learning.