The Way to Learn Spanish is
to Aim for Fluency
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What most people want when they take a Spanish class is to become a fluent Spanish speaker. (It could be any foreign language.) They probably don’t expect to become fluent in that class, but that is what they would like to achieve eventually.
But after one or two courses, or a set of private lessons, the path to fluency can seem very long and daunting. If you take Spanish classes at a university (one of the best ways to learn Spanish), you need to have the equivalent in course work of a Spanish Language major plus spend your junior year abroad, studying and ‘immersing’ yourself in Spanish language and culture to even think about achieving fluency.
What We Do
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At Pars Omni we have been delivering acerated conversational Spanish class for over 30 years. We have taught thousands of individuals as well as groups from companies in the U.S., Mexico, Japan, Austria, Malaysia, South Africa and elsewhere. During the past 3 years we have completely redefined and expanded our program. In the past we taught Spanish and English classes. Our new program includes those classes, but it’s now aimed helping all of our students achieve fluency. So in addition to our classes at various levels, we offer a Spanish Fluency Membership that is Online and includes 7 computer apps, a User’s forum and more.
The focus of our new expanded Pars Omni program is to help you become a fluent Spanish speaker in the easiest, most practical way possible.
Here's what ‘practical’ means:
- The program’s cost is relatively low.
- It’s easy to fit into anyone’s busy schedule.
- It does not require foreign travel, at least until you reach the minimal level of fluency we call Practical Fluency.
- A lot of the program can be done at home or anywhere and on your own time.
The chart below shows the progression of the two fluency skills, understanding and speaking, as they evolve from ‘Beginner’ through ‘Fluency’.
What you practice to become more skillful changes as you move from one level to the next. Understanding what those practices are and how to do them is the key to your becoming fluent.
There are literally thousands of books, DVD programs, classes, tutoring approaches and online programs that teach you ‘Spanish’. They all work in the sense that you will always learn some of the Spanish language (or something about the Spanish language) with any of them. But few of them, alone, will even get you close to fluency.
The Pars Omni Spanish Fluency Program shows you exact practices to improve your understanding and speaking skills at each level. And the Program is practical: you accomplish the 4 levels from Basic through Practical Fluency on your own, and on your own schedule, using our Spanish Fluency Membership software.
At the beginning, we offer our Foundation Spanish Class. It’s for those who are just beginning their study of Spanish and also those who have takes some classes or other instruction quite a while ago and are feeling like they can no longer access what they once new. More information
The Spanish Fluency Membership Program is a subscription based program whose main purpose is to improve your passive knowledge of Spanish as quickly and easily as possible. This program also focuses on developing your ability to speak Spanish, but your biggest hindrance to improving your speaking ability is always your lack of passive understanding, which must take priority. More information
At the Basic level you have the ability to converse in Spanish with a basic vocabulary of 1500+ words and you have the ability to express yourself in 6 verb tenses in the past, present and future. This gives you a taste of what fluency feels like: you can carry on simple conversations with (cooperative) native speakers. You need to have these abilities and the confidence that you can already converse in Spanish in order to make good progress in, and persist in, the Membership – because there you’ll be on your own.
By the time you reach the end of the Intermediate Level, you may want to engage in tutoring or practice conversations or advanced conversational classes or (best) travel abroad in order to get more practice speaking Spanish with native Spanish speakers. We offer some of these programs and there are plenty of other providers of such programs.
Of course, you can focus on speaking or conversational practice even at the Basic or Intermediate Levels – any such practice is always good – as long as you don’t sacrifice your Membership time devoted to improving your passive knowledge. Failure to follow this guideline (usually due to ignorance) is why many of the following students experience frustration at their lack of progress or abandon their studies:
•Those who take one-month or less ‘intensive’ Spanish classes in Spanish language countries before they’ve reached at least the high-Intermediate level
•Those who take private tutoring before they’ve reached the Advanced Level.
When you are fluent your world looks like this:
And here's what you can do:
Participate fully (understanding and speaking) with Spanish speakers and culture:
And if you don't reach fluency in Spanish what can you expect?
From Beginner to Elementary level your world looks like this:
Rudimentary participation with Spanish speakers and culture at best:
At Intermediate level your world looks like this:
Limited participation with Spanish speakers and culture:
At Advanced level your world looks like this:
Participate substantially well with Spanish speakers and culture:
3. There's an amazing ability that you (we all) have to learn languages
You (we all) learned out native language without effort or study
If you don't use that same natural ability to help you learn Spanish - or you don't yet know how to use it without having to travel to a Spanish speaking country - you'll miss out on the one thing that can guarantee your success no matter how many classes or programs you take.