A tight budget doesn’t need to be your reason for not learning Spanish. Luckily, there are some great free tools available to help you practice and hone your skills. Whether it’s learning a few words every day with an app that uses spaced repetition, picking up new phrases from an online community, or mastering your […]

Always on the lookout for new Speaking Latino material I found myself multi-tasking last night at a local bar. In the restroom I ran across this graffiti with a basic Spanish mistake at just about at eye level. While the quote is entertaining, the artist apparently didn’t do well in his Spanish classes. Just in […]

This is a simple, basic Spanish mistake. In fact, it’s so simple I am not even going to give you time to figure out the error. There’s a missing space in between the words manos and antes. I know, it’s petty, picky and being a perfectionist. BUT, while the message is clear here that may […]

A one letter difference on this menu results in an embarrassing basic Spanish mistake here. This would not be a problem if the menu were used in a restaurant in a non-Spanish speaking country. However, I found it where Spanish is the native language. Since most of the menu is in English, identifying the mistake […]

UPDATE: Read an opposite view to this blog post at Learn Spanish in Puerto Rico: Immersion Program ISLAShould you Study Spanish in Puerto Rico? When asked my opinion about studying Spanish in Puerto Rico I answer truthfully. “Do not study Spanish in Puerto Rico.” I often say this in Puerto Rico, surrounded by Puerto Ricans. […]

I ran across this street sign walking around one day. I find it entertaining for its ornate writing and that someone put so much care into creating the sign, then decided to post it on the street. For anyone having problems reading the sign it says “Deposita La Basura al Safacón” It also happens to […]

If you are learning Spanish think about infusing your daily life with it. Here are some quick and easy ideas to immerse into Spanish while doing your regular daily routines. 1. CHANGE YOUR SMART PHONE AND TABLET TO SPANISH. All the app icons that you look at every day will now have a new meaning for […]

Welcome to today’s Learn Spanish Quiz. One of my ideas for Speaking Latino is a series of flashcards to help with learning slang. Always searching for new ideas and with this in mind, I grabbed a box of 1000 Spanish flashcards sitting on the shelf and randomly pulled out a card. Reading the card, my […]

The words pero and sino both translate to “but.” However, they cannot be used interchangeably. Pero is used when you are looking to convey “nevertheless” or “yet.” Examples: Estaba muy cansada, pero no me dormí. (I didn’t fall asleep, but I was very tired.) No tenemos gaseosa, pero tenemos limonada. (We don’t have soda, but […]

This post is part of the series Warming up for El Día E: Posts to Improve Your Spanish. El Día E is a world-wide celebration of the Spanish Language that will take place on June 23th, 2012. Posts in this series to celebrate El Día E: 1. Join the Celebration of El Día E 2. […]

This is the first post in the real life Quick Quiz Spanish mistake series. I will be posting an item I find, first with the original view of the item. There may be a hint about how many or what type of errors there are, and when you continue reading, the errors will be revealed […]

Seriously? A translation error on the cover of a Spanish Phrasebook. Am I wrong? Anyone out there that would translate ¿Bailas? as You dancing? Please leave a me a comment bellow. Check out these other articles to help you Learn Spanish.

This warning sign mounted on a trolley surprised, even disappointed me. As a business student, one company you always hear about as an example of how to manage a business well is Disney. Their commitment to creativity, customer service and detail in their parks is held aloft as a goal for other companies to achieve. […]

There are several words/phrases that translate to RIGHT in Spanish: derecho, derecha, correcto, and tener razón. Of course, not all of them can be used interchangeably – that would just be too easy. Here are the Spanish differences for the word right. 1. Right in Spanish: DERECHO El derecho, used as a noun, means a […]

A guest post by Francesco D’Alessio There are many different ways you can learn a language. One of the growing methods is using the wonderful range of applications on your smartphone. Apps are exploding in popularity thanks to their ever growing range of resources. There are hundreds of language learning applications in the App Store […]

Just like diminutives, augmentatives have different uses and there are several augmentative endings. These often convert everyday words into local slang. The most common Spanish Suffixes are: ón/ona, ozo/oza, and ote/ota. In Spanish, augmentatives are used to express large size or great intensity Examples: Grande – big Grandote – huge Perro – dog Perrote – […]

The most common ending for dimunutives is ito/ita. However, in certain countries, you will also see ico/ica when the last letter of the affected word is a ‘t.’ Other endings include: illo/illa, ín/ina, ete/eta. The use of diminutives in Spanish often indicates that something is small. For example, gato is cat, so gatito is a […]

The Spanish mistake in this sign is extremely subtle. With only four words there’s not a lot of room for errors. In fact, there’s a small hint in one of the smaller signs around the main sign. Give up? Ready for the hint? The small sign at the bottom of the photo says “Welcome to […]

One of the many confusing hurdles about the Spanish language is that it has certain rules that are often not clear when described to native English speakers since no equivalent exists. A good example of this would be the two different forms of the past tense, the preterite and the imperfect. While it is unfortunate […]

I ran across this sign hanging from the ceiling recently in a hotel in South Beach, Miami. There are two basic Spanish mistakes here in the translation. Can you identify them? The first error is in the first word, huéspuedes, and is the missing accent over the letter E. The second error is the phrase […]

Many people, especially those who hate textbooks and studying, are sure that finding a Spanish speaking significant other is the key to learning the language. As someone who learned my Spanish in school and then perfected it while living abroad, I can answer this question for you. It Depends Sorry, I’m sure you were hoping […]

Spanish is a wonderful language to learn; it is the third most spoken language in the world with over 400 million speakers worldwide. Learning Spanish is a great skill to have if you love traveling and can also be extremely useful in business when dealing with Spanish or Latin American firms. With Spanish spoken in […]

Yes, SEVEN meanings with just the four letters P-A-P-A. And if you mix in a couple other words with PAPA then there are even more. In a recent article Ignore These 5 Fundamentals to Become Fluent Faster I stated that beginning Spanish learners should ignore the El/La articles on nouns, as well as the accents […]

Before YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, a famous house paint commercial from Puerto Rico became viral locally during the 1990’s. To promote their company, Harris Paints created a song with Caribbean rhythms and a patriotic lyric coupled with images of colorful splashes of paints. Frequency and a captive audience ensured this song stuck in the minds […]