A little help from overseas

I had about 4 months to go before my oral exam when I decided to try and get some extra help and found Verbalplanet whilst looking for native Spanish tutors online. I took a couple of lessons with a few different teachers just to see who would be a good fit and decided to go with Laura as she's a native Spanish speaker and I thought it was pretty cool that I could learn with someone actually in Spain. She knew exactly what level I was at and had loads of listening and speaking exercies which we could work on together.

It took a few lessons for me to get going and do more of the talking, so it was hard at the beginning, but I can definitely say it's exactly what I needed. I think it helps massively when you can have a conversation with someone about topics that you are interested in. I think you naturally want to try and have that conversation which helps you overcome your fear of talking.

I think one of the biggest advatages to having a language tutor is they can adjust the speed at which they talk to you. At the begining Laura was careful not to make me feel as if I couldn't understand anything. As my lessons progressed, and my confidence grew, Laura picked up the speed and I became more confident listening to a 'normal' paced conversation. This worked really well as I found that in my actual oral exam the speed seemed slower and I felt much more confident in my responses and that I had correctly understood what I had heard.

Quick Facts: Spanish

The Spanish language is an Iberian Romance language and part of the Indo-European family of languages. It is estimated that there are around 410 million people that speak Spanish, making the Spanish language the most widely spoken Romance language in the world. Spanish originated as a dialect in the Cantabria region of Spain; from that region, its use gradually spread to the kingdom of Castile, where it became the principal language of government and trade. It was later brought to the Western Hemisphere and other parts of the world in the last five centuries by Spanish explorers, colonists and empire-builders.

The Spanish language is spoken on all continents, most extensively in North and South America, Europe, and certain parts of Africa, Asia and Oceania. With mainland Spain and the Balearic islands being popular holiday destinations for many Europeans, the number of people choosing to learn Spanish online for leisure purposes has been increasing, making the Spanish language one of the most popular languages in the world to learn.