Struggling With Greater Difficulty in Level 2 of Rocket Spanish

Level 1 of Rocket Spanish was challenging, but do-able.  Now I have begun Level 2 of Rocket Spanish, which is proving to be much more difficult for me.  I understand the concept being taught in the lesson, but cannot complete all the activities.  There are too many lengthy phrases to memorize; and the phrases are being played too quickly.  Sometimes words are slurred together indistinguishably.  I have found web applications which can slow down audio files, but I cannot figure out how to download the audio files being played in the activities.  Does anyone know how to download the audio files from the activities?

Even if I was able to slow down the audio clips, there are still too many phrases for me to memorize!  I have to repeat the same activity at least 3 times to answer everything 100% accurately, and there are 4 activities per lesson!  Should I move on to the next lesson even if I haven't mastered the previous lesson's activities 100%?  The problem is that I am using Rocket Spanish for my high school Spanish course.  My grade for my high school Spanish course will be derived from the grades I receive on the Rocket Spanish module tests.  The content of the module tests is from the activities in the lessons.  So if I don't master the activities for each lesson, I won't score well on the module tests (which determine my grade for my high school Spanish course).

So far I have spent 3+ frustrating hours every day for several days trying to master the very first Level 2 lesson.  Despite so many hours of struggling, I have only managed to complete the audio lesson, Hear It / Say It activity, and Write It activity.  Those are the easiest activities; now I must attempt to tackle the Know It activity and Flashcards.  In reality, I cannot keep spending so many hours on Rocket Spanish once my high school and college classes resume.  How can I learn the phrases faster and recall them more accurately without spending so much time?    Does anyone have any advice or ideas for me regarding any of the difficulties presented in this post?  I would be very appreciative of any suggestions!  Thank you for you time.

Honestly... I'm coming to the end of Level 2.. right now i'm on 13.2. I stopped doing any of the reinforcement activities at all other than the quizzes , it's archaic teaching that all schools use really and it's why so many people leave knowing nothing of languages. Cramming does not work, period. Look up spaced repetition and try to build a system to get it into all of your subjects and you will find you you will retain more information this way.

I just went back to review 9.1 and I understood it completely and  would  i be able to do all the exercises perfectly? maybe not, but I can definitely understand all the phrases as well as have a good understanding of the following exercises as-well.

you'd be much better served just moving on, you will learn quicker just seeing as much of the language as you can in context with explanations, don't beat yourself up too hard if you don't know something, or forget something, just come back and review the material and expect and accept you will forget stuff, it's how the brain works, but trust that this course will constantly reuse the most important words until they stick.

Also, if you are serious about learning, supplement your learning with things such as podcasts(coffee break, notes in Spanish), reading short stories (Olly Richards), Youtube (Dreaming Spanish super-beginner), maybe children's programs (Pocoyó) and finding natives to speak to! (hello talk, tandem)

¡Hola HeatherS21 y JoelH15!

Thank you very much for your feedback! HeatherS21, I will cover each of your points in its own section below.

1. Speaking Speed

It's an unfortunate truth that native speakers of any language talk quite quickly, and Spanish speakers are notorious for their rapid-fire speech! To help learners adjust to the speed of a native speaker, we try to progress towards a more natural speaking speed with each level of Rocket Spanish. The faster speech will be difficult at the start, especially in the very first lesson, but don't be discouraged! It's a matter of tuning your ears, and it will absolutely become easier over time. You'll notice your own improvement if after every few lessons you circle back and try an earlier lesson again.

Unfortunately, it's not possible to download the individual audio files for each phrase.

2. The Activities

There are a variety of Reinforcement tools in each lesson so that people can find the method that works best for them - you don't have to do all of them if you don't want to! My advice would be to select the Reinforcement activities that you find the most helpful for your own learning and focus only on them before moving on to the next lesson.

Alternatively, if you'd like to make sure that you practice with each type of activity so that you're ready for the Module Certification, you can also try alternating between the activity types - so perhaps do the FlashCards and Hear It! Say It! for one lesson, then Write It! and Know It! for the next. 

3. Learning Faster

As for how to learn phrases faster, it's actually easier to learn and to progress if you don't try to learn too much at once, and if you don't let yourself get hung up on the things you're having a hard time remembering, as JoelH15 says. After all, your brain can only take in so much at a time, and that's perfectly normal!

You might find it easier to break the lessons up into chunks of 20-25 phrases/words and concentrate just on one chunk per sitting. This lets your brain focus on a manageable amount of information at a time and helps to make sure that you don't get overloaded. If you're having trouble with a phrase or concept, you can also just move on and come back to it later, as JoelH15 suggests. 

I hope that this is helpful, and that I've managed to answer all of your questions! If anything is unclear or if you have any more questions, don't hesitate to ask!

Liss

Muchas gracias a todos ustedes!  Both JoelH15's recommendations and Liss-Rocket-Languages-Tutor's advice are helping me already!  I can think more clearly and learn a lot more now that I'm not trying to cram for hours at a time.  I'll try alternating activity types as I study lessons.  At the library I checked out some picture books and children's Spanish programs.  After researching spaced repetition, I have found some flashcard apps which I will begin to utilize.  I will continue to find and implement what works best.  Thank you both for your help!

Hey Heather. I'm glad to have helped in whatever way I could, Language learning is a tough journey and you have to use everything at your disposal! 

As far as reading is concerned I would recommend Olly Richard's short stories for beginners personally... even if you don't understand every word, as long as your are getting the gist you will improve! This man learned 8 languages! His graded readers are seriously great for my confidence and a great way to see some language that gets gradually harder in context.

As far as watching children's programs, don't worry if you can't understand everything, neither can kids when they watch them! The language is very basic but it is extremely visual so I would recommend watching them without any subtitles and I guarantee you will pick up some words! this is especially true fro the ones based around learning such as pocoyó and Dora la exploradora.

It is believed that "Anki" is the flash card app for learning... but anyway, as far as the best way to learn vocabulary in flash cards, there are a few techniques to help with the process... one is when you learn a word, learn it in the context of a sentence, even think a few up for yourself.
The next one is try to think about what that word or idea means to you ( in spanish if you can!) do you have a past memory that you can link to it? A smell? A sight? Maybe look for an image online that makes you think of the English? If you do this, all of those things will also fire in your brain along with the word, and I guarantee it will stick better!
The final idea you can use is thinking up your own mnemonics, i'm not sure if I got this one from Rocket Spanish or elsewhere, but an Idea of this is Poder -> podemos -> Hippopodemos! Hippopotamus! You can also find many of these online!

Buena suerte!