How to improve your Spanish reading skills
With the New Year approaching and resolutions in mind, many people will be thinking about finally getting to grips with a foreign language. Whether it’s a question of picking up a new language from scratch or a decision to brush up on already existing skills, there’s one thing language learners want to know: what’s the most effective way to learn? Of course if there was a definitive answer to such a question, the whole business of learning that second language would be a lot more straightforward. Here the importance of reading in a foreign language is championed. The reason why reading complements other language skills such as conversation is explained and some tips are set out to help you make the right choice in your reading material.
There are quite a few aspects to learning a language. These include: communicating orally through conversation; aural comprehension through listening; and reading. Of these, most significance is normally attached to oral communication. It’s easy to see why this might be the case: speaking a foreign language is perhaps the most public sign that someone has begun to master that language. At the same time reading is often overlooked. For anyone coming fresh to a language or returning to a language they already have some proficiency in, this really should not be so.
The advantages of reading in a foreign language are many. The principal advantage is that it helps all your other language skills. It’s never been established why but it’s well known that when you read in a foreign language your conversation skills, writing skills and listening skills all improve. One reason for this could be that when we read a book or a newspaper article in any language we face the same sentence constructions over and over again. We also see the same vocabulary and this helps us to remember how sentences work and what words mean.
There’s also unlimited choice of reading material. You don’t need to spend a lot of money buying books or materials – you can read foreign language newspapers easily online and buy books second hand on internet auction sites or online bookshops.
In the same way that reading in your native language brings events and ideas home to you, you’ll discover that reading in a foreign language makes issues more immediate and helps make countries more alive and relevant.
If you read in a language other than your own and you stick with it, your success will only make you want to read more. The sense of achievement you feel when you finish that first foreign language book or news piece will only spur you on to read more.
These are some of the reasons why you should read in a foreign language. What’s the best way to start reading in a foreign language?
The most important thing to remember is to go at your own pace – it’s not a race and you’re not going to be expected to sit any stressful exams.
You should also choose your material carefully – you might love to read Shakespeare in English if you’re from London, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be able to get to grips with Don Quixote in the original Spanish - save it for later and choose books that you’ll know will interest you. At the same time don’t aim too low with your reading choice.
Always try to choose material that will fire your imagination. Make the language and the country come alive to you, and you’ll see a steady improvement. Interested in soccer, start following foreign leagues and read the newspaper reports online. Is cooking your hobby? Why not read up recipes from abroad in your language of choice?
Don’t spend time looking up every word in a dictionary. It’s tedious and turns the reading experience into a stuttering and unnatural experience. You’ll be amazed at how you’ll understand the overall sense of a passage by focusing not on the unknown, but on the known. Concentrate on what you know. Look at the verbs first and work out who’s doing what. That often helps you get the idea of what’s going on.
A Foundation course is a preparatory course for university-level art and design education, used particularly in the United Kingdom.
Finally, if you’ve time, read a difficult passage a couple of times and you’ll get to grips with it in the end.
The crucial importance of reading in language learning cannot be underestimated. It helps other skills and is an easy, inexpensive activity to practice. Above all it makes the language alive in your mind and opens up all sorts of horizons to you.