"Is that a Spanish dictionary in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?"

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish | Spanish Words & Phrases - (16 Comments)

Dictionaries are COOL.

Really.

If you’re trying to learn Spanish without one, not only are you completely loco, it’s going to take you longer to learn Spanish. If I were you, I would have three (and no, I haven’t become a dictionary salesman overnight). Let me tell you why.

Ever seen those picture dictionaries for kids? If you’re a beginner, Spanish picture dictionaries are a great way to learn Spanish nouns. If you feel silly buying or borrowing one of these, don’t – there’s nothing like seeing a Spanish word in context to help you remember it.

This idea of connecting a picture of something with the Spanish word for it in your mind is actually the basis of my popular MegaSpanish software games (more about these in this article: Spanish Word Games)

More importantly, if you haven’t got a teeny tiny pocket-sized Spanish dictionary – go get one. Seriously. One of the best ways to learn and remember new Spanish words is by learning them as you need them.

Imagine you’re in a train station and you need to buy tickets – you know the word for ‘one’ (uno) and ‘ticket’ (el boleto), but how do you say ‘one-way’? I can just about guarantee that if you look this up in your travel Spanish dictionary right then and there, you will never forget the Spanish word for ticket again.

While Spanish word lists are certainly handy, there’s nothing like boosting your Spanish on the spot with a decent travel dictionary.

As for your THIRD Spanish dictionary, if you’re serious about learning Spanish – especially reading and writing the Spanish language - you’ll need to invest in a quality Spanish translation dictionary with definitions in your native language. I’m talking a decent doorstop size here – one that will serve you well as you progress  from Spanish beginner to fluent Spanish speaker.

But if Spanish dictionaries will never be cool as far as you’re concerned, perhaps MegaSpanish is more your style – if you want to know more about these software games that build your Spanish vocabulary, and test your memorization of Spanish words, you can get the full story here:  Spanish word games

Mauricio E.

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Cooking Up A Storm Spanish Style

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish | Spanish Travel & Culture - (13 Comments)

It’s one thing to stroll aimlessly through the markets in Spain, Mexico or South America, with all the time in the world and nothing in particular to buy, but where do you go when you have to cook up a storm Spanish style?

This quick audio lesson will help you with grocery shopping in Spanish – at least it will help you get to the right place – as for what happens when you get there – that’s a whole other lesson!

If you’re a beginner Spanish learner, these are some essential Spanish words for you to know – even just being able to recognize these words will make sure you never go hungry!

Listen carefully to my pronunciation and repeat each word aloud until you feel confident.

La carnicería Butchers

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La confitería Sweet shop / Candy store

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La panadería Bakery

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La pastelería Cake shop / Pastry shop

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La pescadería Fish shop / Seafood store

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La verdulería Vegetable market

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La frutería Fruit shop

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La cervecería Brewery

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La bodega Wine cellar

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La heladería Ice-cream shop

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La pizzería Pizza shop

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La lechería Dairy

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La tienda de comestibles Grocery store

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And if there’s a spare seat at your table, I’m always open to invitations!

Best wishes,

Mauricio E.

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How to Make Friends With Spanish Grammar

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish | Spanish Grammar - (9 Comments)

Before I tell you how to make friends with Spanish grammar, I’m going to tell you WHY you should.

If you’re serious about learning Spanish, you need to understand it. This is where your Spanish grammar comes in.

By taking the time to understand how the Spanish language works, you will speak more naturally, and be able to adapt the Spanish words and phrases that you know to many different situations.

Many beginners shy away from learning Spanish grammar because they think it’s going to be difficult. Well it doesn’t have to be – if you follow these two very easy steps:

  1. Keep it simple: learn just one or two Spanish grammar “rules” at a time.
  2. Put your new Spanish grammar “rule” into practice: next time you’re speaking Spanish, USE it.

After you’ve actually used your new Spanish grammar “rule” in conversation a few times, it will become second nature. You won’t even think about it as “grammar” any more, but rather as a great way to say more things in Spanish.

I’ll give you an example, so you can see how quick and painless it can be.

Let’s look at how you describe things in Spanish. It’s important that you get your Spanish nouns and adjectives in the right order – because this is one of the biggest differences between English and Spanish.

In English, you say “white horse.” In Spanish, you say “horse white” (caballo blanco). Descriptive words always come after the noun they describe (such as gato gordo, “fat cat”).

Now, think of some of the Spanish words you know to describe things, such as chico (small), bueno (good) or hermoso (beautiful).

Next, think of some Spanish nouns that you know, and put them together – in the right order – the next time you practice speaking Spanish.

Not so hard at all right?

If you’re feeling a little friendlier towards Spanish grammar, you can check out my free lesson on Spanish adjectives –remember, learn in small chunks, and USE your new-found Spanish in conversation. There’s tons of information here, but I’ve broken it down into easy to learn mini-lessons, so don’t think you need to learn everything all at once:

Free lesson on Spanish adjectives

Best wishes,

Mauricio E.

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Learn Spanish 101 – Day One

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish - (0 Comments)

Guest Blogger: Jennifer Johnson, Rocket Spanish student
Native Language: English
Foreign Language Status: Shrinking Violet (aka “I know nothing”)
Foreign Language Ambition: Confident, Articulate, Fluent Spanish Speaker
Progress Update: Day One


Mauricio tells me Rocket Spanish will see me go from shrinking violet in the “Which languages do you speak?” conversation to confident, articulate, fluent Spanish speaker. If  it could also be arranged for me to be transformed into a beautiful Latina at the end of my course that would also be wonderful.

Hi and hola folks. I’m Jenny – one of Mauricio’s Rocket Spanish students. I’m sure I’m not alone in admitting that I have, on many occasions, filed language learning in the New Year’s resolution box, and simply carried on with the household chores or after-hours work.

I know speaking another language will open up a fabulous new world, I know it will make me a more interesting person, and I know it will make my holidays overseas a heck of a lot easier to organize, but I’ve just never found the time.

This year I’ve decided to break the never-get-around-to-it cycle and get in before the New Year. I WILL learn Spanish, even if it kills me. Mauricio assures me it will not.

Mauricio also thought it would be “fun” for me to share my Spanish learning experience.

While I’m not completely convinced exposing my linguistic weaknesses to the world wide web will do wonders for my reputation as an otherwise pretty cool customer, I have to agree it might be for nice for you to know you’re not the only one who might be confused by conjunctives, or struggling with subjective pronouns. But if along the way you decide “less is more”, feel free to leave me a comment!

So I guess the beginning is always a good place to start. My first Rocket Spanish encounter was a quiet morning at work, when I listened to a sample audio track with my first coffee of the day.

So imagine me in my office, with my taped-up, seen-better-days headphones, saying  my first Spanish words out loud and feeling pretty silly (it’s okay though, I get in reasonably early so nobody was there).

It was worth the risk of my boss walking in and laughing though – I knew straight off that I was on to something. After a few minutes of practice, my pseudo English/Welsh/New Zealand accent was nearly vamoooosed and replaced by an exotic, whimsical tone perfectly suited to the streets of Chile. Well, perhaps that was my early  morning day-dream, who knows – either way, I wanted a whole lot more of that!

So… now a proud owner of the Rocket Spanish Premium course, I’ve settled in at home to get down to the business of learning some real Spanish.

I have done a quick situational analysis and I am 100% ready. I have muted the Charlize Theron True Hollywood Story, the lighting in my apartment is optimal and my only distraction is the sound of the dishwasher which I can do very little about unless I want to eat off the floor tomorrow.

Laptop: READY

Jennifer: Ready as I’ll ever be.

After taking a tour of the Rocket Spanish Learning Lounge (this is the online members area where my course and quizzes and stuff are kept) to make myself at home, my  first stop: interactive audio lesson 1.1 – Introductions.

Now, and this may be the first point at which you utter a large ‘tut’ and think to yourself ‘is this lady for real?’ but here goes, am I the only person who thinks ¿y tú? sometimes sounds like ¿y dú? I hope not, but you never know… Think I’ve cracked it now but am going back for another go just to make sure!!

Second time around it seems a lot clearer, my ‘tu’s and ‘du’s are fully under control – phew. I’ll leave it here for now – after this very light dipping of my toe I may need a siesta!

How are you brave folks past lesson 1.1 going? What’s your favorite lesson so far? What are the hard parts, when I may need a glass of wine close by?

Until next time..

Jenny J.

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10 Ways Learning Spanish Just Got Easier

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish - (3 Comments)

Luckily for me, my learn Spanish course has always been really popular, but I’ve been wanting to give the Rocket Spanish online members’ area a major make-over for a while.

It’s finally done and dusted, but before I knock the top off a cold one to congratulate myself on completing this massive task (ok, ok, before I knock the top off the second one) I thought you might like to know how all my hard work is already making it SO much easier for people to learn Spanish in a short space of time.

I call it understanding the needs of Spanish learners in today’s digital culture, and an intelligent choice in the field of online and media-rich language learning tools.

You can call it the Rocket Spanish Learning Lounge. Here are 10 ways learning Spanish just got easier:

1.    You can start learning Spanish within minutes – I’ll give you instant online access to the Rocket Spanish Learning Lounge, where you’ll find all of your course materials, software learning games, interactive quizzes, self-tests, and more.

2.    You will get 24/7 online access to the Rocket Spanish Forum, where I will answer your questions, together with other Rocket Spanish teachers, other native speakers and Spanish learners.

3.    You’ll be speaking and improving your Spanish every lesson, by taking part in the modern, everyday conversations that make up my full Rocket Spanish Premium 31-lesson Interactive Audio Course.

4.    You can learn Spanish anywhere anytime, by transferring all the audio lessons to your MP3 player, accessing them online or downloading the course to your computer.

5.    You will understand why you’re saying certain things in certain situations, and get a handle on written Spanish and my fascinating culture with the 31 Grammar & Culture Lessons (which include embedded audio, exercises and activities).

6.    You will build your Spanish vocabulary and improve your audio recognition of common Spanish words and phrases with my popular MegaSpanish software games MegaAudio and MegaVocab.

7.    You can follow my easy-to-use recommended learning path or choose the lessons in the order that is most important to your life and work – and you won’t forget which lesson you’re up to or where you’re headed next because I’ve included a progress tracking feature in the Rocket Spanish Learning Lounge.

8.    You will know much your Spanish has improved by using the Rocket Spanish interactive quizzes and self-tests, and when you’re ready, you can get certified with the Rocket Spanish Certificate Tests.

9.    You get an unlimited lifetime membership to ALL OF THIS, so you can take the time you need to feel confident, and look back over your lessons and notes whenever you want.

10.    You’ll get immediate access to any future upgrades of the Rocket Spanish Learning Lounge (I’m always adding new features)

You WON’T BELIEVE how easy it is to learn Spanish with all this at your fingertips – I’ve designed Rocket Spanish so that you can learn at your own pace, when it suits you, and most importantly, ENJOY it.

I’ve made sure there’s absolutely nothing standing in your way of becoming the fluent Spanish speaker you want to be – I strongly encourage you to see how my Rocket Spanish course will do wonders for your Spanish in only a matter of weeks.

For more info click the link:  Learning Spanish Just got Easier

Best wishes,

Mauricio E.

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5 Handy Questions to Know in Spanish

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish | Spanish Words & Phrases - (18 Comments)

Today’s post is going to give you a super-fast double-whammy crash course in asking questions in Spanish.

If you’ve only got 2 minutes before you head off on vacation – just get these 5 handy questions into your head and you’re done.

If you’re not rushing off to Mexico just yet, you might like to read to the end of the post, because I’ve included some handy tips at the bottom, to help you understand how to actually ask questions in Spanish without causing confusing anyone along the way.

#1. Where is the bathroom? ¿Dónde está el baño?     

#2. How much is it? ¿Cuánto cuesta?

#3. What would you like to drink? ¿Qué te gusta tomar?

#4. How are you? / How’s it going? ¿Cómo estas? /  ¿Cómo te va?

#5. The museum is on the left, no? El museo está a la izquierda, ¿no?

Bonus Q. The car has gas, right? El carro tiene gasolina, ¿verdad?


Spanish Pronunciation Tip: Unlike English, you don’t raise the pitch of your voice at the end of a question in Spanish. Rather, you ask the question (interrogative) word in a higher-pitched voice and drop your pitch for the rest of the question.  But don’t get caught out by #5 -  you should raise the pitch of your voice when you say ¿no? or ¿verdad?

Spanish Grammar Tip: Punctuation marks in Spanish are almost exactly the same as English—except for two. If you wish to add a question mark (?) at the end of a sentence, you must also add an upside-down question (¿) mark at the beginning (the other exception is an exclamation point, which I’ll talk about another day)

Good to Know: As in English, you may use a statement to ask a question as long as you raise the pitch of your voice at the end of the question.

So no need to be shy – get out there and ask some questions, and let me know how you get on!

Mauricio E.

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Essential Spanish Words for Your Vacation

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish | Spanish Travel & Culture - (20 Comments)

If home is where you hang your hat, home never looked so good as after a long day of sightseeing.

When you’re hot and weary, and could kill for a cold beer, you want to sort out your bed for the night as fast as possible right?

Whether you’re traveling in Spain, Mexico or another Spanish-speaking country, you’ll have several different types of accommodation – alojamientos – to choose from. Just think, you’ll be one step closer to that beer if you already know how to describe the kind of place you’re looking for…

Here’s a quick audio lesson on a few essential Spanish words to know for your vacation. Listen carefully to my pronunciation and repeat each word aloud until you feel confident.

Click Play To Hear the Audio

Youth hostel  Un albergue para jóvenes

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Inn (Spain)  Una fonda

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Inn (Mexico)  Una posada

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Spanish villa  Una villa

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Boarding house  Un hostal

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Guest house (Spain)  Una pensión / Una casa de huéspedes

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Country houses (Spain) Casas rurales

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Travel Tip: Cases Rurales (literally “rural house”) are country houses in the Spanish countryside. This is ideal accommodation if you’re seeking a quiet, natural environment, local food and contact with local people.

On a shoe-string budget? A great way to travel around Spanish-speaking countries on a budget is backpacking.

As a backpacker – un mochilero – you’re more likely to discover and explore areas that only the locals know about…

Click Play To Hear the Audio

Backpacking  Viaje de mochilero

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Backpacker  Mochilero

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Remember, practice makes perfect! You’ll be happy you saved your precious vacation time by learning these essential Spanish words. There’s plenty more where this came from – you can tune in for more free Spanish lessons by subscribing to this blog.

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The Art of Spanish Pronunciation

Posted by Mauricio in Spanish | Spanish Pronunciation - (4 Comments)

If you’re looking for some quick tips on how to pronounce Spanish words or a free step-by-step Spanish pronunciation tutorial with audio, I can help.

Whether the Spanish language is completely new to you or you’ve been flexing your Spanish skills for a while, there’s nothing like a little reminder about pronunciation.

Many language learners get into bad pronunciation habits that are difficult to break, and bad pronunciation can cause confusion and misunderstanding (if you’re lucky, you’ll get a laugh, but the consequences could be more serious!).

Take the time to get this right at the start, or, if you’ve gone a little way down the track with your Spanish lessons but you have suspicions that your pronunciation isn’t quite up to scratch, take some time out to practice this before you go any further.

Make sure to practice the sounds you find most difficult, not just those you feel more comfortable with. Your patience with a little pronunciation “drilling” will be rewarded with a near-native accent!

You’ll get a lot more out of the free learn Spanish tips on this blog if you put aside a few minutes now to polish your pronunciation:

Spanish Pronunciation Tips
Step-by-Step Spanish Pronunciation Tutorial

¡Nos vemos! (See you)

Mauricio

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Hola and welcome to the Rocket Spanish Blog!

Posted by Mauricio in Rocket Languages | What's new! - (3 Comments)

Hola and welcome to the Rocket Spanish Blog, where you can learn Spanish words and Spanish phrases for free! I’ve got some great Spanish grammar tips and I can answer all your Spanish language questions.

I’m Mauricio Evlampieff, a native Spanish speaker and creator of the popular Rocket Spanish course. I hope you find these learn Spanish tips helpful – please feel free to post your questions and comments.

I look forward to sharing your Spanish learning journey with you!

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