Conversation Confidence

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Speaking is hard.

Think about it: you need to not only follow a conversation and think of something relevant and (hopefully) interesting to say, but then summon the right words, put them in the right order, conjugate the verbs, decline the adjectives, and then pronounce them so that people can actually understand you.

Add to that lack of confidence, noisy environments, multiple speakers, and it’s no wonder that many learners prefer just to study a book, thinking they’ll “get to” speaking when they’re ready.

I know how this feels, because I’ve been through that process and have come out the other side.

When you can finally put it all together and express yourself fluently, there’s no other feeling like it. It took me years to develop my fluency, but with the right approach I could have got there much quicker.

We’ve built this course to help you develop fluency in the most common areas of conversation, and learn the underlying principles of becoming fluent.

You can have that liberating feeling of fluency, and of confidence and relaxation in your conversations. Isn’t that why you’re learning Spanish, after all?

In this course

Course Contents

  • Beginnings and endings
    • Saying “hello”, beyond hola
    • Asking and answering “how are you”, and creating original conversations
    • Expressing thanks, beyond gracias
    • Complimenting and wishing someone well
    • Saying “goodbye” in interesting ways
  • Icebreaker strategies
    • Strategy 1: Finding mutual links
    • Strategy 2: Opening questions
    • Strategy 3: Follow-up questions
  • Keeping a conversation going and flowing
    • Commenting and reacting to stay engaged
    • Prompting conversations to keep your partner engaged
    • “Muletillas”: Spanish conversation crutches to enhance your fluency
  • Meta Spanish: Talking about Spanish, in Spanish
    • Paraphrasing, and “working around” words
    • When you’re lost for words
    • Rephrasing yourself, and checking comprehension
    • When you’re completely lost in the conversation
    • Asking what something means
  • Challenge 1
  • Short interactions
  • Asking for something
    • Using poder in everyday conversation
    • “Is it ok for you”? – an easy and natural phrase
    • Ordering in 101 ways (well, maybe not 101…)
    • Other ways to ask for things
  • Challenge 2
  • Describing people
    • Our favourite people adjectives
  • Describing places
    • ¿Cómo es…? Vs ¿Cómo está…? , how to finally nail them
    • Phrases using ¿Cómo es…?
    • Phrases using ¿Cómo está…?
    • Our favourite place adjectives, to bring your description alive
  • Challenge 3
  • The preterite and imperfect: the key you’ve been missing
  • Practical tips for using the imperfect
  • Practical tips for using the preterite
  • Time phrases and patterns: useful tense “signals”
  • Challenge 4
  • Expressing likes and dislikes, beyond gustar
  • Saying how you feel
  • Subjunctive hooks with emotions
  • Agreeing and disagreeing in original ways
  • Challenge 5
  • Making requests and offers
  • Arguments
    • Starting an argument
    • Connecting your ideas
    • Finishing an argument
  • Challenge 6