Learning Spanish

[cobraboy]

I would appreciate any input from this group on finding a good CD-ROM or DVD based conversational Spanish course.

I'm not looking to teach the "Kings Spanish" , just be able to converse initially until I learn more by actually living with the Dominican people.

TIA

[kronos]

Pimsleur has a 3 course set each with 30 lessons. They run about $300/course on CD. Save some money and borrow it from your local library.

[ricktoronto]

Originally Posted by cobraboy

I would appreciate any input from this group on finding a good CD-ROM or DVD based conversational Spanish course.

I'm not looking to teach the "Kings Spanish" , just be able to converse initially until I learn more by actually living with the Dominican people.

TIA

Something called "Rosetta Stone" and then again some don't (a library might be a good start for both formats to see which is better or worse) .

I suggest checking for learning with some actual humans as well in your home town - CD and tapes are OK but on their own it is not as interactive as a class or private lessons. Not Berlitz (big buckeroos) but community college, or maybe Spanish centres where they have language and cultural stuff and group and private classes.

I think not learning to teach Spanish is a wise goal since you need to learn how to speak it first.

[timelessdreams]

Originally Posted by kronos

Pimsleur has a 3 course set each with 30 lessons. They run about $300/course on CD. Save some money and borrow it from your local library.

Pimsleur also has Quick and Simple (4 CDs) for $19.95, very affordable and quite good! I play them in the car!
www.pimsleurapproach.com

Happy learning!

[ricktoronto]

Originally Posted by timelessdreams

Quick and Simple

Just hope your girlfriend doesn't think of you this way.

[Lambada]

Timelessdreams is a woman.

[Paulino]

Originally Posted by cobraboy

I would appreciate any input from this group on finding a good CD-ROM or DVD based conversational Spanish course.

I'm not looking to teach the "Kings Spanish" , just be able to converse initially until I learn more by actually living with the Dominican people.

TIA

I suppose that you meant to write "learn", not "teach" the "King's Spanish". Anyway, learning "proper" Spanish isn't of too much help in the DR, since their spoken Spanish is quite different from Spanish spoken in other parts. After more than 30 years of studying and learning Spanish, and being married to a Dominican woman for the last 11 of them, I still often have serious problems understanding what people actually are saying to me. That includes my wife, at least whenever she is around her own, and reverts to their way of speaking. Although I have no problems reading, writing and also speaking well enough to be understood. And my hearing is "20/20". Maybe I'm dim, but that's the way it is, as seen from my perspective at least.

[cobraboy]

Originally Posted by Paulino

I suppose that you meant to write "learn", not "teach" the "King's Spanish".

That was a joke.

I want to converse in Dominican Spanish, slang and all. I don't want to conjugate verbs and diagram sentences on a chalkboard. I can order a beer, and do a little flirting, but that won't help much in a business negotiation...unless I'm negotiating with a pretty lady over a beer...

When I use a web translator on Dominican Spanish, there are many words that don't translate. That is not the case foe Mexican, C.A., or Iberian Spanish.

Thanks for the input, all!

[ricktoronto]

Originally Posted by cobraboy

That was a joke.

I want to converse in Dominican Spanish, slang and all. I don't want to conjugate verbs

If you don't want to conjugate verbs you won't be able to speak the language other than sounding like a rube talking in infinitives all the time.

[cobraboy]

Originally Posted by ricktoronto

If you don't want to conjugate verbs you won't be able to speak the language other than sounding like a rube talking in infinitives all the time.

You left out the diagraming sentences part.

I was trying to say I do not want a formal education in learning Spanish. I want to learn conversational Spanish.

I'll try to be 100% totally accurate before I crack a joke next time.

Nobody wants to be a rube. But you don't want to talk like Prince Charles in the Bowery, either.