How To Use Our Site | How To Interact

Bienvenidos a 

INVESTIGATE | INTERACT

Please note the intentional design of this website. We learn ABOUT the language and we USE the language.

We INVESTIGATE and we INTERACT in Spanish. 

You can INVESTIGATE our Spanish guides on grammar, slang, pronunciation, cheatsheets, practice on our Formative.com platform or other independent sites, etc.

AND

you can INTERACT and USE your Spanish to find out more about the products, practices and perspectives of the Spanish speaking world. 

Listen to the podcasts, read the comments, listen to the opinions around the world on social media, etc. 

Talk to each other, add comments on social media, give your opinion to other Spanish speakers,  improve your fluency. 

Write to each other through Formative. 

Share your discoveries, recipes, music, etc. Get feedback from your peers and from me. 

Why do we call the website for our classes
LA COOPERATIVA?

Well, language acquisition is a social activity. Apprentices have to work with masters of a craft/fluent users of the language to become proficient. One teacher should not be your only form of input or fluent user of Spanish. You need to hear as many varieties of Spanish as possible, as much of the culture as possible until you gravitate towards the ones that suit you the best. 

We are all language learners in just different places in our journey and with differing destinations.

We all have different goals, strengths and preferences. We don't have to be limited.

Yet we need to socialize with each other and more proficient speakers of the language to improve. 

We cooperatively create this website so that we have one place to share all that we discover. In fact, some of you may very well go out and create your own podcast, YouTube channel or lead a group by example in whatever gift you have to offer the world. 

This site is meant to respond to a need for a quick, visual system to see and use what we have learned. Also, it gives us a chance to gain more listening and reading content, in other words, input in authentic Spanish. Spanish that is used today. 

Becoming proficient in a language nowadays is such a varied, dynamic and very personal endeavor.

We have so many free resources to pull from and be exposed to that any one approach makes no sense or will change according to each experience and new resource that you encounter. Also, as you progress, you learn about yourself and get bored with one resource or way and try out another new experience to keep it exciting and fun. 

We don't do boring!  Yes, some aspects of language learning seem like they have to be boring but they really don't. IN FACT, your brain doesn't like boring if it is trying to imprint the memory or have the task performed without thinking.  By keeping tasks fun or a little anxiety building keep your brain alert.

Some linguists would say we are improving our INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATION SKILLS, our INTERPRETIVE READING AND LISTENING SKILLS or our PRESENTATIONAL WRITING AND SPEAKING SKILLS. Others may just simply say we are working on our listening, speaking, reading and writing in Spanish.

I would say that you are learning cultural content in Spanish at the same time you are becoming more proficient in Spanish. Indeed, you will never stop learning both the culture and the language. There is no finish line. Just the experience of new discoveries. Discoveries that you just have to share.

At the moment, the organization of the site is coming together. Language learning is not linear nor should it be. It's not how our brains fix it in our head.  

Some resources here will have corresponding Formative.com activities or assessments. Not every theme has a corresponding Formative.com set of exercises or self graded tasks at this time.

These happen as the classes unfold.  If there is a topic that you would like me to create some activities for you to test your knowledge, tell me in class or send me a quick email message or chat message. See the bottom of every webpage.

Gracias mil,