The Best Learning Spanish Routine: Do This Every Day
¿Estás buscando la rutina perfecta de aprendizaje que te permita hablar español así? (Are you looking for the perfect learning routine that will make you speak fluent Spanish like this).
But without having to spend hours and hours a day and spending a lot on hundreds of different grammar books?
Then this is the lesso for you! Today, I’ll show you “the perfect learning Spanish routine”.
Una rutina que te tomará solamente veinte minutos diarios (A routine that will only take you 20 minutes a day) helps you use fun materials and easily fits into everyone’s daily life, so you stay motivated!
Would you like to know what a day in your life with the perfect learning routine would look like? Then acompáñame!
1. Start the day by listening to Spanish
If you want to learn a foreign language, it’s important to read and listen to that language as much as possible. De esa manera escucharás como los hispanohablantes hablan ¡y tu cerebro se acostumbrara a cómo suena el idioma! (That way you’ll hear how native speakers speak, and your brain will get used to what the language sounds like!)
Even though you won’t notice the benefits immediately, in the long run this will help you with listening comprehension and speaking at the same time.
Para asegurarte de que no te saltes tu dosis diaria de español, empieza tu día escuchando música en español. (To make sure you don’t skip your daily Spanish input, just start your day with it! By listening to music in Spanish). Or brushing your teeth while listening to a Spanish podcast, or watching one of our Spring Spanish videos while having breakfast.
¡Apenas acabas de desayunar y ya has hecho más por tu español que mucha otra gente en un día entero! (You’ve only just had breakfast, and you’ve already done more for your Spanish than most people in an entire day!)
So in my ideal Spanish language learning routine, I will add in some Spanish listening or reading everywhere you can. Here are some more example resources:
- nuestros videos (our videos) (Tip: we also have videos that are 100 % in Spanish, and they go with Spanish and English subtitles)
- podcasts
- otros canales en YouTube (other YouTube Channels) -> check out our two videos about the best channels of our colleagues
- libros con historias cortas (books with short stories)
- algún libro o curso con conversaciones en español (a textbook or course containing conversations in Spanish). Like the ones we have in our Spring Spanish Academy 😉
2. Review flashcards with chunks 5-10 mins a day
The next thing to do every single day (it might even be the secret Spring Spanish weapon) is reviewing flashcards with chunks for 5-10 minutes a day, whenever you have time.
But not just any type of flashcard: you have to use a very specific type, called the cloze card.
Let me show you. Let’s say you hear someone say at the airport. Ahora tenemos que pasar seguridad. (Now we have to go through security). Or you hear it in a song, or any other place where you listen to Spanish. Like, in our videos.
Pasar por seguridad is a useful chunk to learn, so we put it on a flashcard in the context where we originally found it, but with the chunk we want to learn blanked out:
FRONT:
Ahora tenemos que ___________ (go through security).
BACK:
Ahora tenemos que pasar por seguridad.
Now we have to go through security.
If you memorize cloze cards with chunks like this every day, you’ll improve your Spanish massively!
And you can easily do that with an app like Brainscape (like we usually do with our students in the Spring Spanish Inner Circle), you can just take 5-10 minutes a day to review chunks like this and learn new ones… and you’ll be memorizing them almost on autopilot!
Así que tómate algo de tiempo diario para memorizar flashcards cuando puedas: (So take some time every day to memorize flashcards whenever you can):
- En la mañana (In the morning)
- Camino al trabajo (Commute to work)
- Cuando vas al baño (When you go to the bathroom)
3. Do some actual studying (not necessarily daily)
In your perfect Spanish routine, once in a while, you’ll still need to sit down and do some actual studying with a real language course.
Pero, aquí tienes las buenas noticias: no tienes que hacer esto día a día (But here’s the good news: you don’t have to do this every day). You can spend most of your time getting exposure to Spanish, and just a little bit of time actually studying Spanish, and you can make great progress!
Así que, ¿qué tan frecuentemente debes realmente estudiar? Idealmente, por lo menos un par de veces a la semana en sesiones de 15 a 20 minutos. Deberías usar un curso que te enseñe diálogos, para que puedas ver cómo se usa el español. (So how often should you really study? Ideally at least a couple of times a week with sessions of 15-20 minutes. You should use a course that gives you dialogues, so you can see how Spanish is used.) Then the course will teach you chunks and grammar concepts that appear in these dialogues. This way of learning is called Conversation Based Chunking.
4. Speak Spanish!
Finally, in your ideal Spanish learning routine, you should speak some Spanish as well, of course! Find someone to speak Spanish with, either in your community or maybe a tutor. Try to speak 2-3 times a week for at least 15 minutes. If you follow your perfect Spanish study routine consistently, that conversation will go really well:
- ¡Estoy aprendiendo español con Spring Spanish todos los días!
- Wow, ¡felicidades! Hablas muy bien.
- ¡Gracias! Estoy practicando desde hace 34 años.
- Ya va, ¿cómo? ¿De dónde eres?
- De Venezuela, ¿por? Ey, ¡espera!
Recap of the perfect learning Spanish routine
There you have it: a perfect day of learning Spanish! As a summary, here’s what’s included in a perfect day of learning Spanish:
- Listening to a lot of Spanish, reading as well
- Learning cloze cards daily
- A focused study session with a dialogue-based course
- Speaking a bit of Spanish
