Premium Materials - Guide

Each week we publish additional materials to help you get the most out of Coffee Break Spanish. You may well remember the content of a lesson for a few hours after you listen for the first time, but in order to consolidate all the language covered it will really help to use the extra materials which revise the language in a variety of ways. The Coffee Break Spanish materials are in three parts. To find out more, click on the icons.

The PDF Guide for each lesson gives excellent written backup for everything covered in the main podcast. Each guide includes sample conversations using the words and phrases from each lesson. The guides also include bonus vocabulary. Find out more here.	Coffee Break Spanish top-up podcasts revise the vocabulary covered in each lesson in a different way, sometimes including music or relaxation techniques to maximise your learning potential. Find out more and access samples here.	With each edition of Coffee Break Spanish we provide Flashcards which can be downloaded and copied to your computer or portable media player to help you revise on the go. Click here for more information.

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Comments

[Ian]

Thanks for getting me kick started towards my winter in Cadiz. Most language guides help you find your way to a shop and then how to deal with the shop assistant. In Spain we have noticed the other customers in the bakery, butcher and even at market stalls want to talk. We believe they want to know what position you are in the que. Please give us the best dialogue to use. Thanks. Keep up the good work.
Ian

[Ian]

Thanks for getting me kick started towards my winter in Cadiz. Most language guides help you find your way to a shop and then how to deal with the shop assistant. In Spain we have noticed the other customers in the bakery, butcher and even at market stalls want to talk. We believe they want to know what position you are in the que. Please give us the best dialogue to use. Thanks. Keep up the good work.
Ian

[Clifton Parchment]

Are you ever going to do the itunes podcast in video. I believe If I can see you and the words you are teaching I would learn the language easier.
Cliff

[Mark Pentleton]

Hi Cliff. For the time being we're not planning video podcasts. There's a fair amount of time involved in putting the audio podcasts together and we hope that the quality of the audio podcasts is pretty good. If we were to introduce video podcasts this would increase the amount of time involved in post-production and I'm afraid we don't quite have this kind of time at the moment. Hopefully by reading the guide or using the flashcards as you're listening you'll be able to follow what we're talking about and see the language written.

There is a chance that we'll be looking at developing an enhanced podcast for a subscription model after Christmas, but we'll want to make sure that enhanced podcasts will be accessible for as many of our listeners as possible to avoid alienating any listeners.

[George Horner]

I was wondering if you were going to (or could) cover different words and meaning for different Spanish-speaking regions? For example in Lesson 6, you used the words marido and mujer for husband and wife, but the words I was familiar with were esposo and esposa; when I studied Spanish before, mujer was used simply for "woman".

[Everett Batey..]

Thank you very much. Great voices for old ears. But, the first vocab I hit was too weak to hear well. Lesson 1 & 2 so far great .. Do you address differences in formality using "y tu" vs "y ud"?

[Mark]

George: there are a fair number of regional differences in vocabulary and accent used across the various Spanish-speaking areas of the world. My own experience is in mainland Spain, and this is the type of Spanish we'll be concentrating on. Where appropriate I'll be mentioning some of the words used elsewhere, and from time to time I'll be giving examples of a "Latin American" accent (without trying to generalise too much!). However, given the stage of Spanish we're trying to cover with CBS, it's important not to give too many words for the same thing, hence not mentioning "esposo" and "esposa" in the original podcast. For information, these issues are discussed at greater length in the bonus podcast. I hope this answers your question.

Everett - we've been talking a fair bit about the different forms of "you" in Spanish, and since lesson 2, I've been giving both forms because there are regional differences as to which form is used. I'm also interested to know which vocabulary you found difficult to hear. Was this in a particular podcast? I'm obviously keen to ensure that the quality of our materials is very high. Do let me know - perhaps via email or the forum?

[Kaye]

I just ordered the Lesson one pack. Paypal processed the order but at the download link I got the message "http error 404 Sorry we couldn't find the file you are requesting coffeebreaspaish/cbs-03-pack-061108.zip". What can be done? Like the podcast very much and hope to have the print materials to practice more.

[Mark]

Kaye, I'll look into this as soon as I get home. I'll be able to send you new links to give you access to the materials. ¡No te preocupes! (Don't worry!)

[Eliane]

Ola! Me llamo Eliane (pronounced like Elly-Ann). Soy de Francia. Vivo cerca de Paris. Soy secretariado. Tengo un marido. Mi marido tenga un hijo y una hija. Se llaman Raphael y Victoria. Estoy encantado de apprender espanol con CoffeebreakSpanish. Me gusta mucho la Escocia. Hablo Ingles y me gusta mucho de apprender espanol con Mark y (very much smiling) Kara. I found this podcast quite by chance and am delighted because at the same time, I can revise my English, listen to the Scottish accent and learn a new language. Que viva internet! Keep comparing sounds in different languages, it helps.
My best wishes to both of you and little Matthew for 2007. Let's learn more through the new year. Feliz Navidad a todos y hasta pronto. Eliane

[Pete Winston]

The best way to learn spanish...Thank You!

[Kati]

Hi Mark and Kara. Like Elliane, I happened upon your podcast by chance and was impressed by the quality of the lessons. I am a second grade teacher in New Mexico, U.S. and Español is part of our curriculum. I do not speak spanish but a large percentage of the population of New Mexico does. I have always wanted to learn the language but I think at my age that braincell has atrophied so I leave that curriculum area to my fluent teaching partner! The way we teach second graders is to learn vocabulary and string together some statement and question sentence that we use over and over. I can't seem to keep the vocab in my brain if I can't use it in everyday conversation. I am inspired to try again after listening to a couple of your lessons. My sister thinks we should go to Guatamala for 6 weeks this summer and do an immersion program at one of the language universities. I was wondering if anyone has had any experiences with a language immersion program. Thank you for all your hard work on this site! Kati

[vicki]

to Kati:
¡si! ¡si! ¡si! if you can go to ANY language university en otra país (in another country), i would TOTALLY advise you to do it. two months is great.

i went to cuernavaca, mexico last summer and would LOVE to go there again for a full semester. i, too, am not a young woman, i will be 48 in january and have played with learning spanish for many years, but only seriously for the last 3. it is very difficult, especially, i think at my age, but PLEASE don't give up! it it is soooo worth it, i think.

i am envious of my friends who speak fluently, but they encourage me a lot and tell me that one day, soon, i, too will speak as well as they!

the immersion way is SUPER on so many levels. DO EVERYTHING. school, living with a spanish speaking family who will be very kind and helpful and patient with you and your mistakes. go out in the communities, on school-sponsored field trips (safer and a guide who explains what is going on and are usually bi-lingual), absorb EVERYTHING and AS MUCH AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE
DO NOT
use english from DAY 1! the more you struggle to say even the simplest things, the more you will learn, remember and the sooner you will begin to speak.
read, write, listen to EVERYTHING you can in spanish. it isn't easy, but it will get better. don't expect to learn another languge in 8 weeks. a dear friend told me once that it takes a baby 3 years to learn the basics of speaking and even longer than that to speak it well and correctly, so DON'T GIVE UP. (i think i'm convincing myself of this as i write to you! :-) ).

keep trying to learn. you are NEVER too old.
GO TO GUATEMALA and have a BLAST!
take all the precautions you will hear and don't worry about anything. just be careful, cautious and go expecting to have the TRIP OF A LIFETIME! you won't regret it.
vicki

[Bela]

Hey, just discovered you via iTunes and am glad to find you. However, I have a Creative Zen instead of an iPod. Have you considered also creating a Zencast? I don't think they're very hard but I haven't set one up myself so I'm no expert. If you could that would greatly help automate my downloads. Thanks for your help either way!

[Ron]

Great job. I grew up in a spanish-speaking area of Texas, but I've gotten away from it. I have an interest in reconnecting and your podcast is a great was to begin that process. Muchas gracias!

Ron