Learn YOUR Spanish, not someone else’s
It’s amazing how some learners drudge through really dry, boring material, just because they’re supposed to do it.
I don’t consider that a good reason to do something.
If your passion is baking chocolate cakes and everything chocolate, what are you doing learning all the snowboarding terms that are listed in your textbook? Focus on the vocabulary that fits your interests.
I realize that if you’re in school, you’re going to have to go after the grade in addition to your actual learning, which means you’ll have to learn what they want you to learn as well.
But here’s my reasons not to study boring material.
You’ll lose interest
If you focus on material that holds little interest to you, it will kill your interest in learning Spanish. It’s fine with me if you lose interest in, say, plant vocabulary and start learning animal vocabulary as an alternative, but if you are forced (or by free will choose) to spend inordinate amounts of time trying to study something that doesn’t pique your interest, the result will be that you lose interest in your target language altogether.
You won’t learn as quickly as you could
Interest in a subject is a strong motivating factor, and as I’ve written before, motivation has a lot to do with your learning. So if your motivation is lower than it could be if you were more interested in the subject material of the Spanish you’re learning, your learning will slow to a crawl.
You won’t learn as good as you could
A high level of interest in the vocabulary you’re learning will help your retention. When you engage more senses in the learning process, you learn better. So for example, if politics is where it’s at for you, and you’re studying politics (and the associated vocabulary) in your Spanish lessons, you’ll engage more of you in the learning process. In addition to studying the vocabulary, you’ll be comparing, associating and debating what you’re learning with what you already know. That process results in “better” learning. By better, I mean your learning of the Spanish language will benefit.
Here’s what you should do
If you’re in school, I’d recommend you study the vocabulary and subject material that is put before you. In most cases, it will be fairly basic material that will serve you later as you go on to study more. But in addition to what you have to learn, go out on your own and study Spanish in the context of subjects you love. There are so many sources of material– books, magazines, television, movies, internet videos, forums, blogs, newsletters, literature, poetry, music– find material related to things you take a personal interest in, and start interacting with them. Write down the words you hear. Try to imitate what they’re saying. Form your own opinions on the subject. Express yourself in Spanish.
If you do the above, you’ll combine your passion for (___fill in the blank___) with your language learning, and I’m convinced your language learning will be the beneficiary.
You enjoy this post? You might like to subscribe to the blog.
That’s some good advice. You always need to keep it real and one way to do that is to make sure you’re really into whatever you’re studying.