I can write in Spanish, but I can't hear it.

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rats_and_cats
Veteran
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Joined: 28 Jul 2016
Age: 30
Gender: Female
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Location: USA

08 Sep 2016, 11:23 am

In other words, I can understand the vocabulary and everything, but when somebody is speaking Spanish at the speed people normally talk, I can't keep up. I can't distinguish one word from another. I'm in my third semester of college Spanish and that problem is not going away. I want to minor in Spanish so that I'm bilingual, but if I can't actually hold a normal conversation in Spanish after three semesters, maybe I should stop.



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Sea Gull
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Joined: 5 Feb 2014
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08 Sep 2016, 12:55 pm

It's normal for beginners not to be able to understand a language when it's spoken at native speed.

Try doing a language exchange (many are available online via Skype or similar voice messaging services) with native speakers, to gradually accustom your ears to hearing the language at native speed.

At first, your ears may only pick out one word in fifty, and the rest will sound like "babblebabblebabblebabblebabble"

Then, if you stick with it, you will start to pick out one word in every ten. Then one in four. Then one in two, etc.

Please note that I am not talking about necessarily understanding the words at this stage, but rather, simply distinguishing them as individual words. It's about getting your ears to start picking out individual words and realising where one word ends and the next word starts (even if you don't yet know what said words mean) as opposed to just hearing one single long stream of sound.

Whether you decide to stick with it or not depends on how motivated you are and how important it is to you to learn Spanish.