Hablas Espanol??

After some ten years since i last took the time to do so, i decided that I was going to start learning another language again. I remember way back when, when i was joining college that i had wanted to keep up with the languages but, alas, science being the harsh master/mistress (take your pick) that he/she is, it wasn't feasible. I always thought it a shame given that i was once told that i was a natural linguist. So, after some deliberation and thought, i chose Spanish as the appropriate language for me to start learning. The main reason was that it was one that i had very little knowledge of indeed (aside from the obvious) which is always a good start - building yourself up from the bottom of the house of cards, as it were. The other reasons were that it opens up a lot of potential countries around the world to visit (21 speak it as their primary language), it's quite widely spoken in parts of the US ('cause of the large hispanic population), is one of six official languages of the UN (along with English, French, Chinese, Russian and Arabic) and, according to an article on the most influential languages of the world, Spanish ranks third behind English and French. On top of that, i also have a couple of Spanish colleagues so plenty of chance to practice - after all, use it or lose it, is what they say.

Thus, having chosen Spanish, i scouted around for Spanish classes to attend - and came across the Berlitz Language Center in Charleston (Berlitz are renowned for writing travel language guides amongst other things) and duly put my name forward for a class. The system is based on the idea of conversational learning in that if you are spoken to in the language and duly repeat it, then you will learn it quicker. Kind of an 'immersion teaching' but without actually going to the country in question. The teachers are all native speakers, and the classes can vary in size (my class has four people in and is the maxiumum size). For me, personally, i always find the reading and writing aspect of any language the easiest and it's the speaking and listening that's the harder of the four disciplines (listening probably being the most difficult). One good thing about the method is that they try to get you just to think of the language as it is, rather than translating back in your mind to your own language. This, i think, will make you a more proficient speaker in the long run. Okay, so i've only had the one week of classes so far (the course for each level is 12 weeks or 3 x 45 minute lessons, so pretty intense) but it was fun indeed and definitely reminded me of how much i liked it in the past. Watch this space.