3 months and no where near fluent. Normal or not?

[Aguaita29]

I studied English for about 3 years when I was a teenager. I was able to hold a conversation with someone before my first year but it took me a while to get to a point in which I could feel that I was fluent. At first I really had no big expectations. Learning was actually fun for me and I enjoyed the process!

<OI used to read a lot, listen to music in English and TRIED to watch movies as often as I could. Because there was no chance to practice with native speakers, we allowed a couple of Mormons to come over once a week. Too bad then they decided that we HAD to baptize, so we got rid of them!

<O We also used to have some Jehovah Witnesses come for a bible study. There was a Canadian couple I used to enjoy talking to.

<OSomething that helped a lot was when we got cable and we had access to news, tv shows, movies without subtitles, etc. I even enjoyed the commercials!

<O I didn?t get to travel till years later and it was great! People thought that I had lived in The States so that was pretty cool. I think that traveling or living abroad BRIEFLY can do so much more for you after you?ve already got a good foundation than if you?re on an early stage. <OIt?s very easy to get discouraged and feel disappointed when you?re just starting!

<OI also studied French briefly, on and off, and I really like it but my experience with it has been different. I was once invited to a dinner with a bunch of French people and the only thing I was able to understand was ?ah bon? and that was really frustrating!

<OSometimes I watch TV5 and I don?t understand anything. If I try to watch a movie in French I understand random words here and there but that?s pretty much it! I`m thinking of going back to taking classes!

 

[PeterInBrat]

Agreed that there are many stops and starts. Sounds to me like you need to get out more on your own so you don't have a crutch so much.

My first Spanish lesson:
My dad takes me to a Pollo Carbon shop in Sosua around 1990. He hands me some cash and has me repeat "How much?" in Spanish. He said don't worry about what they say, just hand over some money. If it's not enough, they'll ask for more. If they don't give the right change, don't worry about it, because the peso is so weak. Then he says, "By the way, I have to go to a meeting in SD tomorrow and won't be back for two days. You're on your own til then."

Once you meet a girl, your drive for learning will go WAY up..

 

[Givadogahome]

I can't be bothered to read the entire thread, but replying to the OP, you are doing good, you are trying. I know people who have lived here 15 years and still speak Northcoast Spanglish.

You are never going to get it all, even in your own country, if someone speaks with an accent and local jive you struggle, I know because that is what accents are about (ok pg, accents...... I know, I know).
You are doing well, keep it up.

 

[Celt202]

I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Thailand. My training group of 90 had 3 months of intensive language immersion training. Classes were Monday through Friday for 7 hours a day and conducted entirely in the Thai language. I could speak the language and clearly understand the teachers at the end of training.

I asked for an assignment outside of the capital city where there were no other Peace Corps volunteers. I didn't want to be distracted by a clique of other volunteers hanging out together speaking English all the time.

Fluency in the classroom is one thing. When I reached my assignment it was cold water in my face. I could communicate and I learned very fast to ask people to speak slowly. A ready smile, a sense of humor and patience was necessary.

At the end of training we were given a very good book of self study to learn how to read the Thai alphabet which I worked hard to master. I worked at a public health center and I would spend two weeks a month with a team from the center travelling around to villages where there was no electricity. The village head man would put us up and in the evenings we would eat and sit and talk for hours. I would ask my associates to explain words and I would write them down. My practical vocabulary expanded rapidly.

I was really fluent in the language after one year. Training gave me enough to get around and function but a year of experience broadened and deepened the ability to a level of complete fluency.

You're right where you need to be. Training has brought you to an expected and normal point of beginning fluency. Your foot is in the door. Now you can work to become really fluent.

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/4lnA_vX7fuM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

[pollogringo]

And remember, learning a language is not a straight rising line, it goes in steps. You may be frustrated feeling you have no progress, then you make a brake, and some times later: wow.

That's right. It goes in plateaus.

 

[Expat13]

You can always ask people to speak slowly!

Funny I do that all the time especially on the phone (mas despacio por favor). After which their speed of speech increases.

 

[PeterInBrat]

The Thailand reference reminds me of a recent SNL sketch:
SNL: Rosetta Stone | Video on Clip Nation

 

[JMB773]

And if you really want to have some fun learn as much Spanish as you can living in DR and talking with Dominicans then go to Mexico City and try to hold a conversation with a local there.

The problem you are making is your telling your brain how far along you should be at any given moment. You will be "fluent" when you are "fluent" its that simple.

Remember is school when you waited the last second to study for an exam and you tried to overflow you brain with as much info as you could before your eyes became very heavy? Now remember how easy the exam was when you studied over a 2 week period oppose to the one night of cramming. Learning a new langauge works the same way.

 

[AlterEgo]

I think foreign languages are just easier for some people. And others just can't do it. I grew up around 4 Italian speaking grandparents, never spoke a sentence myself. Only English growing up in our home. Got married to a Dominican and had 2 kids, only English in the house. Son took Spanish for the first time in high school. Spent a summer in Santo Domingo and came home chattering fluently. Got a perfect score on Spanish AP exam in junior year, so took Italian in senior year. Did Study Abroad in Florence Italy, and voila! Fluent Italian. Italians don't believe him when he tells them he's American.

Now contrast that with me, married into a family who doesn't speak a word of English [my husband is the only one who speaks English] for almost 40 years. I do speak Spanish, but after 4 DECADES I wouldn't call it anything close to fluent. Still a lot I don't understand. I'm a smart person, why can't I "get" it?

Our daughter took after me....looks like a carbon copy of her dad, and can't talk to her cousins.

 

[rafael]

Because many of the responses have mentioned age, I will add that I am 19 years old and a sophomore in college. And just to add details, I understand reading extremely well. I actually have started reading stories in Spanish in these last few weeks, nothing too challenging, but not quite elementary either. It's hearing people speak that stumps me. I just can't seem to make out what people are saying to me, and they look at me like I am an idiot, but often it just sounds like mumbling to me. It's so frustrating because I really am eager to learn.

You studied spanish. Go to a country that speaks spanish and you would understand more. Here we speak dominican. Natives mumble. . .it doesn't sound like mumbling. . .it IS mumbling. I would wager your major problem is you are not hearing where one word ends and another begins.

Years ago a member here named Cliff posted about his experiences moving here to teach english. The first "spanish" word he learned? Naylu......look it up. . . .go ahead . . .I dare you. . .

What does Naylu mean?

Hint it is heard when electricity goes out. . . ..

NO HAY LUZ in spanish is naylu in dominican. . . .

 

[PeterInBrat]

It's been hit or miss with me. I hit a plateau in Spanish a while back and the lack of proper grammar in the DR doesn't help much. Oddly, I found Japanese the easiest because it is very consistent with the grammar. Estonian was ridiculously hard, but also the most beautiful.

 

[Celt202]

The Thailand reference reminds me of a recent SNL sketch:
SNL: Rosetta Stone | Video on Clip Nation

Too funny

 

[La Profe_1]

What you are being told about the difference between proper and Dominican Spanish is the truth. I speak proper Spanish in my work environment, both face to face and on the phone. I read and write the language to the point that I can write business letters in Spanish and prepare grant proposals and reports in it.

I always have to ask people to speak more slowly because I'm hard of hearing - and the speed of Dominican Spanish makes it impossible, as someone mentioned, to be able to hear distinct words.

In spite of this, I still have difficulty understanding street Spanish here. So, you are certainly not alone in having difficulty with the Dominican version of Spanish.

 

[Lando calrisian]

I think you mentioned that you have a companion that helps you bridge that which you do not understand. You need to lose that crutch. You need to let go and stop thinking about the words and just accept the whole process of what the people you are interacting with are asking or speaking to you about. It'll happen magically and seamlessly one day, it'll just "happen".
When I lived in Quebec learning French, I couldn't understand anything. I refused to speak to any English speakers, no English tv, no English newspapers and it just happened one day I was watching the morning news and I was like "Sacre bleau, eh bien comment dit les Quebecois T@B&RN@C!!! Je peut comprende tout!

So just wander out there alone and don't be afraid, let your inner tigere come out, baja el grajo un poco.

 

[dv8]

when i worked in the pharmacy i insisted on reggaeton/dembow radio station. i listened to all thew songs with much enthusiasm and my dominican workers used to tell me the lyrics. first literally: what is being said; and then what it means thanks to that i know some nasty dominican street slang that i occasionally use
miesposo is born and bread dominican: yet he does not understand the lyrics of these songs. neither literally nor figuratively.

 

[Lando calrisian]

Rafael I just fully read your post, HILARIOUS! Back in the day, when I first went back to DR after more than 8 years I didn't understand so many things, I thought something was wrong with me.

 

[rafael]

What you are being told about the difference between proper and Dominican Spanish is the truth. I speak proper Spanish in my work environment, both face to face and on the phone. I read and write the language to the point that I can write business letters in Spanish and prepare grant proposals and reports in it.

I always have to ask people to speak more slowly because I'm hard of hearing - and the speed of Dominican Spanish makes it impossible, as someone mentioned, to be able to hear distinct words.

In spite of this, I still have difficulty understanding street Spanish here. So, you are certainly not alone in having difficulty with the Dominican version of Spanish.

Besides blurring words dominicans cut off syllables. Veng pa ca. . . . .

Even simple words like tres and seis become tre and se.

I live in apt c803, it has taken awhile to explain to my novia that if she says se ocho cero tre. . . . .people will have issiues finding us.

Often colmados and taxis look for apartment 6803. If you cut of tres to tre, you may be cutting off seis to se. . . If you say the seis correctly they should atleast figure out that you have the ability to promounce the entire word so the know you could say seis but if you said se it is probably C.

My fave is when you get to an intersection and ask what to do, unless it is a left turn you are screwed, and even then it is iffy.

Hundreds of times I have had some one in back seat say doble por alli. . . .since I am driving and don't have eyes in back of my head, I have no clue where alli is.

Next hurdle is right or straight because in spanish you have derechA and derechO. Dominicans say derech for both. So if they say derech, and a go straight, they of course meant derecha. In rare cases they will say doblar derech and even my stupid ass can guess it is a right turn.

Of course even when you get past the above 76.8% of dominicans can not correctly say right or left on first try. After you make the derecha they will yell izquierda. . .

 

[PeterInBrat]

when i worked in the pharmacy i insisted on reggaeton/dembow radio station. i listened to all thew songs with much enthusiasm and my dominican workers used to tell me the lyrics. first literally: what is being said; and then what it means thanks to that i know some nasty dominican street slang that i occasionally use
miesposo is born and bread dominican: yet he does not understand the lyrics of these songs. neither literally nor figuratively.

One reason I like Raulin is that I can actually understand most of what he's saying in his songs. I probably worked on at least a dozen translating them while I was studying Spanish more seriously. Even still, there were some nuances that I didn't get until a Dominican explained them to me. Antony Santos has gotten much easier to understand than his earlier albums. Frank Reyes is also a good one to translate:

Word of the Day: Ajena
FRANK REYES - TU ERES AJENA - YouTube

 

[palmiche53]

Do not feel bad about it. Spanish is a very rich latin language that was intended to be used by politicians and the church. This is a language also for lovers, we can go for hours without saying anything concrete. Every Spanish speaking country has his own contribution to the language and it can be spoken very rapidly, cubans are even faster than the dominicans. No way that you can be fluent in Spanish in 3 months. I will tell you what I was told about learning English, "do no worry if you do not understand the song's lyrics" I would tell you this : Do not be afraid to ask them to repeat slowly what they said. If after that you still do not understand what they're saying, you then go BACK FOR ANOTHER 3 MONTHS.