hi guys

going to go to a residency program with a high spanish speaking patient population...was hoping to brush up a little over the next few months...anyone have any suggestions for relearning spanish (I took many years in high school and college but seemingly forgot over hte past 3-4 yrs)...I specifically would like to concentrate on medical spanish, but also need a nice primer on basic grammar and basic vocab as well...any book suggestions or other suggestions would be appreciated...

and no, watching sabado gigante does not count as a suggestion (besides I do that already =)

heart

Where did you match? I am from an area of high spanish speakers and we pretty much learned when we worked in clinic. Practicing with other people who speak is much more high yield than reading a book. If you need the medical words, you could get a medical spanish-english dictionary.


hi guys

going to go to a residency program with a high spanish speaking patient population...was hoping to brush up a little over the next few months...anyone have any suggestions for relearning spanish (I took many years in high school and college but seemingly forgot over hte past 3-4 yrs)...I specifically would like to concentrate on medical spanish, but also need a nice primer on basic grammar and basic vocab as well...any book suggestions or other suggestions would be appreciated...

and no, watching sabado gigante does not count as a suggestion (besides I do that already =)

heart

A fun way to practice spanish is going to spanish speaking chat rooms... you can do that in addition to read/learn the grammar which is not always amusing.

Rent some spanish movies, put on the subtitles in english and correlate.

There are many english-spanish guides for medical personnel, I have one called : "que paso?" endorsed by the American Medical Student Association...it is good but there are many, many more.

have fun!


:)

learningspanishlikecrazy.com - excellent course, 32 half-hour mp3 files that you can dowload to your computer and access to Foreign Service spanish lessons on line. FS lessons are how the CIA and other government employees learn spoken Spanish quickly. the course is $97. did the research on line and compared to the Rosetta Stone and Pisleur courses - found this to be the most effective way to learn how to communicate in Spanish quickly and easily. i also suggest supplementing the course with a "meetup" group - a group of people who get together at all different Spanish levels in an effort to communicate in Spanish in an informal and comfortable setting in major cities. hope this helps and good luck!


A fun way to practice spanish is going to spanish speaking chat rooms... you can do that in addition to read/learn the grammar which is not always amusing.

Rent some spanish movies, put on the subtitles in english and correlate.

There are many english-spanish guides for medical personnel, I have one called : "que paso?" endorsed by the American Medical Student Association...it is good but there are many, many more.

have fun!


:)

wow these are some awesome suggestions...a few friends suggested the pimsleur cds and i have been looking for those as well...preferably for cheaper than the 300 dollars they go for =)...anyway ill defintely be watchign some spanish tv for some time (love that sabado gigante)...hopefully this will get my spanish up to snuff...thanks and if anyone has any good suggestions for spanish books also, that'd be welcomed (i heard madrigal's spanish is pretty good)...

a few friends suggested the pimsleur cds and i have been looking for those as well...preferably for cheaper than the 300 dollars they go for =)...

I've enjoyed using Pimsleur CD for learning Spanish. You can get them for a reasonable price here:

http://www.cheappimsleur.com/

If your residency program is associated with a mid to large university, there will no doubt be many students whose first language is Spanish in the area. At our undergrad university, many of the Spanish majors got together with the Hispanic students once a week and had "Spanish Corner" at a local pizza place. The spanish department always had spanish-related events, many of which were targeted for those who wanted to informally learn the language. So if you are near a large university, check with the spanish department.

perhaps take a vacation after graduation to latin america - just make sure to learn more than "mas cerveza por favor" :)