Spanish Language Immersion: How To Speak Spanish By No English At All

 The method of spanish language immersion is an improvement of the direct method, which is used for persons of any age, but is preferable for intermediate and advanced students.

Description

This method is similar to the direct method but is more radical as anything else but the target language is forbidden. Any communications and explanations are done by using the target language no matter to what extent the students are able to understand what is happening around them.

This method might consist of total immersion or partial immersion. It is certainly applicable both in class and non-class environment – for example, when you are an absolute beginner and go to a foreign country to learn the language among native speakers.

Benefits:

• A natural method that follows the model of how a child learns its first language.
  
   
• It is suitable both for beginners and intermediate students
  
   
• There are no explanations in native language at all, everything is in target language 
   
• Learners can manage well most of the grammar that could be encountered in a normal conversation, without being taught explicitly any grammar at all
  
   
• The idea of imitation is embedded in the concept of the method, so speaking skills and pronunciation can be very well developed
   

Disadvantages of learning Spanish with immersion method:

• Sometimes language immersion is not suitable for adult beginners. If a beginner is plunged into a world where his mother tongue is not spoken, and his knowledge of the target language is at level zero, this could be really a great stress, especially when the target language is used for instructions as well. At best he might progress in too insignificant steps. At worse he might give the whole stuff up and feel that everything is useless. That is why immersion method can very successfully be combined with other methods – by supplementing and laying additional accent on developing oral skills. This is really a very well working combination, especially for people with some intermediate level of language skills.
  
   
• Simulating language immersion is a tough task. For this reason Rosetta Stone – one of the top Spanish language software programs – has a relatively high price.
  
   
• Spanish language immersion might work much better with children than with adults
  
   
• Language immersion is focused mainly on listening and speaking Spanish. Reading and writing skills are not developed. This is normal, immersion works only for your conversational skills.
  
   
• Immersion is similar to the process of learning to swim. It is advantageous to swim in a big pool as long as you know the basic swimming movements. Otherwise you are going to drawn quickly and all the job gets pointless!
   

Recommended level

• Beginners,
• Intermediate
•  Advanced

The immersion method can be a powerful tool for developing oral Spanish skills really fast, but when applied alone might often discourage some Spanish language beginners.

Nevertheless it’s the best method to learn to speak Spanish, without any reading and writing, and without being aware of Spanish grammar at all.

Immersion works also with people who already have certain level of knowledge – predominantly in written Spanish – and are eager to develop their verbal skills as well.

Language immersion can be effective when performed life – either when you go abroad or get surrounded by native speakers. There are many exchange programs for foreign language immersion for students of different age.

The environment of Spanish immersion can be successfully simulated also by software programs.

One of the best software programs for Spanish learning – Rosetta Stone – is based on using the direct method and language immersion in virtual form. Rosetta Stone is a really unique platform as it allows everyone to learn talking in any language without using native language during the learning process.