1. While reading the targeted vocabulary, copy it down on paper and slowly pronounce it at the same time.
2. Make a list of the vocabulary words near the left margin of your paper, then write the English translation in a column to the right. Fold back the Spanish so only the English is showing. With the textbook closed, now write down as many of the words in Spanish that you can. When you have done all that you can, open up the paper and check your work. Circle all those missed and begin a new list. Continue the process until you get them all correct.
3. Write each vocabulary word on a 5X8 index card with Spanish on one side and a picture on the other, then quiz yourself.
4. Write each vocabulary word on a 5X8 index card and then write it in English on a separate card. Play a memory/matching game with the set. Store all of your vocabulary cards in a file box by either category or chapters.
5. Draw pictures either on paper, or in your mind, that is associated with each vocabulary word.
For the Auditory Learner
1. Have a partner read the vocabulary word aloud to you and you give the English equivalent. Then switch languages.
2. Use a recording device to record your OWN voice, pronouncing the vocabulary words. As you begin, say the word in Spanish, then pause silently for 10 seconds and finally say the meaning in English. Once you have recorded all of the vocabulary you have to learn, play it back. While playing it back, be sure to say the meaning in English during the pause, then listen to your recorded answer to check yourself.
3. Using the vocabulary words you have to learn, put it to music so that when you think of that song you will remember the words. You can also make up a song.
ADDITIONAL STUDY HINTS FOR LEARNING A WORLD LANGUAGE
The language that you are learning will be easier if you don't expect it to behave like English!!! It will have different sounds, and its words will have different kinds of meaning fitted together in un-English ways.
Remember that language is a set of habits!
YOU MUST LEARN TO LISTEN AND TO IMITATE - CAREFULLY!!!
YOU MUST LEARN TO MEMORIZE. To learn this new set of habits, you must practice, practice, and practice again until all the sets of new habits become automatic.
Study out loud. This doubles your studying: you're studying with your eyes and with your ears at the same time! (If other people think that you're crazy, don't worry about them. They don't know any better!!!)
Divide your assignments into small "pieces", and then "string* them together. You might try doing your World Language work just before going to bed (BEFORE you get too sleepy to concentrate!). When you are dressing in the morning, try to remember and to repeat what you learned the night before.
Make full use of the time that you spend in class.
YOU CANNOT CRAM IN A WORLD LANGUAGE CLASSStudying a World Language is steady day by-day work. You can't cram for a swimming test!
You don't learn habits and skills that way!!! You build on what you learned the day before.
You need to think. As you think carefully about the material that you are memorizing, you will start to see some rules of the language - before they are even explained to you! This will speed up your learning.
When you are learning to read the World Language, learn to guess intelligently.
You will need to read over, and say aloud, new words and expressions more than once in order to remember them.
Never look up a word in the dictionary until you have read the whole sentence (or, sometimes, paragraph) in which the word occurs.
World Language study boils down to a constant process of learning, forgetting a bit, learning again, forgetting a little less, and then learning again and again until the new language becomes a habit. If you learn this way, you'll learn the language correctly and you will not forget the language, even if you don't use it for a considerable length of time.
(Adapted from Modem Foreign LanguageBulletin No. 1 by Emna Birkmaier.)