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The Story of “First Words”

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On a recent trip to Colombia, I was determined to teach our two boys Spanish. It was a six-week trip, and I quickly ran into two problems.

Immersion was Unavailable

The first problem was the Spanish speaking children our boys found to play with saw them as an opportunity to practice their English. We’d flown all the way to South America to be immersed in Spanish, but we couldn’t escape English.

The second problem was me. I didn’t know the language well enough to provide parental services in Spanish only. In other words, hanging out with dad was no immersion experience, either.

An Optimal Beginning?

What I needed was an optimal way to begin. If the first thing presented to the boys was frustrating, they might lose interest in Spanish altogether. That’s what happened to me in high school, college, and three other Spanish courses that seemed promising. Something didn’t click, and I didn’t know why.

With my children’s language acquisition at stake, I was determined to get to the bottom of flaws in the traditional approach that hadn’t worked for me.

Eureka!

While scouring the web for solutions, the eureka moment came when I discovered A Frequency Dictionary of Spanish by Mark Davies. Davies used computers to analyze 20 million words of Spanish across three “registers” of fiction, nonfiction, and radio. His dictionary lists the top 5000 most frequently used words in the Spanish language. All the more stunning is how important these words are to new language learners.

Using English as a comparison, Davies estimates that you would understand ~90% of every word spoken or written in Spanish if you knew the top 3000 words. And, your comprehension would rise to 95% if you knew the top 5000 words.12

What better way to learn a language than by focusing on learning the most frequently used words first?

Purifying the Gold

Merely presenting Davies list to the boys would have been great, but I wondered if we could do better. After scouring through all 5000 words, I noticed that many of them were similar to the same words in English. In fact, every other word had similarities.

In all, I found ~10% of them (532 words) were nearly identical in spelling and meaning in both Spanish and English. Such words are called perfect cognates, and there are lots of them on Davies’ list.

What if I focused the kids on learning these related words first?

Even Better

With 532 perfect words to begin learning Spanish, I wondered if I could make the boys learning experience even better.

My studies revealed how pronunciation and ear tuning is crucial to language acquisition. Was it possible to have each word pronounced for the boys in perfect Spanish?

Yes! I could ask their grandmother to present the list to the boys. She is a native Colombiana and would pronounce each word correctly!

For my own learning, I switched my smartphone and tablet settings to Spanish. Words and sentences could then be highlighted and read aloud in Spanish. I don’t know if Paulina or Juan are real people, but they taught me how to pronounce thousands of words in Spanish!

From Gold to Platinum

Since returning from our trip, I’ve found four more ways to improve on the optimal first words we discovered for learning Spanish. Each improvement stems from observing the best learning techniques I could find:

  1. Associate each word with a picture.
  2. Have each word read aloud, automatically, using Native pronunciation (in case your Colombian grandmother isn’t available.)
  3. Keep track of progress and the words they have trouble with and present those words differently.

To accomplish the first three, I found a digital flashcard app called Anki (the Japanese word for memory.) Anki does 1,2 and 3 and uses an algorithm to show the words you’re having trouble with more frequently until you get them down. Words you have no problem with are only displayed when you’re just about to forget them (which turns out to be the best way to improve your recall.)

Anki is free and works on all platforms. Here’s what some of “First Words” looks like on the desktop, smartphone, and tablet:

The 4rth Improvement

The 4rth improvement was discovered by going back through Davies’ list. What would be the next ideal batch of Spanish words to learn?

By allowing for words that have up to three characters difference between English and Spanish (but still have the same meaning) it wasn’t hard to find a second optimal batch of 500 words. These allow for minor spelling changes such as replacing the ’t’ with ‘c’ in ’edición’ vs. ‘edition’ and ‘nacional’ vs. national. They also allow for an ‘o’ or ‘a’ after the word as in ‘humano’ vs. ‘human’ and ‘diferente’ vs. ‘different.’

It’s a rare (non-existent?) student who might be thrown off by the minor spelling changes I’ve allowed for in the ‘non-perfect’ portion of the list. But the payoff is enormous!

If you combine the first (532) and second (500) word lists, 787 of them are in the top 3000. These words are used so frequently in Spanish, you’ll rarely read or hear a sentence formed without one!

Hiding in Plain Sight for 100 Years

Before 2006, these words were hidden in plain sight due to the absence of a robust frequency dictionary.3 Since then, “First Words” may be the first serious effort to identify all cognates in the top 5000 and present them in an optimal learning format (Anki digital flashcards.)

It took a while, but I eventually input all 1032 words into digital flashcards. Each word has just the right picture, and each is pronounced by a native Spanish speaker. Words you learn easily are only re-presented when you’re just about to forget them (to optimize recall.) Words you find harder are presented more often until they are learned.

The results have been worth it. Not only are my boys off to an optimal start, but the cards can also be made available to others to set upon their own optimal start in learning Spanish!

Suitable for ALL Ages

In case you’re wondering what this looks like, here’s our youngest going through his Spanish cards for the day.

Many of the top 1000 cognates are advanced words that young children may not yet know in their native English. Nevertheless, they are the most frequently used words in the Spanish language and, therefore, pure gold for anyone learning Spanish.

  1. Davies, Mark, 2006, A Frequency Dictionary of Modern Spanish, Routlegde: “Nation (1990) has shown that the 4,000–5,000 most frequent words account for up to 95 percent of a written text and the 1,000 most frequent words account for 85 percent of speech. While Nation’s results were for English, they do at least present the possibility that, by allowing frequency to be a general guide to vocabulary learning, one task facing learners – to acquire a lexicon which will serve them well on most occasions most of the time – could be achieved quite easily.” ↩
  2. Nation, I. S. P. (1990), Teaching and learning vocabulary, Boston: Heinle and Heinle. ↩
  3. There have been a number of other frequency dictionaries and lists for Spanish (Buchanan 1927, Eaton 1940, Rodríguez Bou 1952, García Hoz 1953, Juilland and Chang-Rodríguez 1964, Alameda and Cuetos 1995, Sebastián, Carreiras, and Cuetos 2000), but all of these suffer from significant limitations. ↩
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Children

Free at Last from Spanish Gender Noun Prison!

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One of the banes of my “Must Learn Spanish” existence has been the INSANE practice of assigning a gender to EVERY NOUN in the language! As a native English speaker, I didn’t know how good I had it, to be free of this nonsense.

The only thing that used to calm me down on the “issue” was knowing how many other great languages share the same burden: Latin, Spanish, French, Italian, German, Russian.

Well, I’m here to say that I’m FREE AT LAST from the gender-noun Spanish prison! And you can be too, by reading the short 197 words I’ve written, below, to break our family out of this jail. It’s as close to a get-out-of-jail-free card that you’re ever likely to find.

Masculine and Feminine Nouns

All Spanish nouns and pronouns are grammatically linked to the masculine (m.) or the feminine (f.) gender (“Gender” is a grammatical property and doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with biological gender.)

It’s important to get these gender associations right because adjectives, articles, possessives, and demonstratives must also agree in gender with the noun or pronoun to which they relate. Therefore, getting the gender of a noun “wrong” can become an amplified mistake.

Fortunately, this arbitrary (and somewhat ridiculous) language burden is ** dramatically** eased by the following consistent patterns:.

  • Nouns referring to males are masculine.
  • Nouns referring to females are feminine.
  • Nouns ending in -o, -or, -aje, -men, -gen are masculine.
  • Nouns ending in -a, -ad, -ed, -ud, -ión, -umbre, -ie are feminine.
  • Many abstract nouns ending in -ma are masculine, (el problema, el tema, ‘theme,’ el clima, el drama, el problema, el sistema, el programa.)

Since the gender of a noun is arbitrary and their number is infinite, I disagree with teachers who say it’s best to learn the gender of a noun along with the noun itself. It’s far easier to internalize the patterns, above while taking note of any exceptions. Here’s the pattern for making nouns plural:

21 Flashcards

It took 21 flashcards to review the complete gender-noun pattern in Spanish. I made the cards using Anki’s SRS (Spaced Repetition System.) As each card is flipped, the example sentence is read aloud in perfect Spanish.

It won’t be long before they are able to forget about gender for the rest of their lives!

Bonus: Plurals in 75 Words

If a noun ends in:
1. A vowel, add -s (libro/libros, puerta/puertas.)
2. A consonant, add -es (pared/paredes, profesor/profesores.)
3. -z, change it to a -c and add -es (lápiz/lápices, luz/luces.)
4. The masculine plural is used if a group involves one or more masculine nouns: (e.g.,
Tengo muy buenos amigos (m. pl.), I have very good friends (where the friends may be male or a mixture of male
and female.)

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500 Optimal First Words to Learn in Spanish (that You Already Know)

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What are the most optimal first words to learn in Spanish for English speakers?

After putting more thought into it than I care to admit, the answer seems obvious (in retrospect.) Actually, you already know them, but probably didn’t realize they were Spanish words as well as English. More importantly, they are high frequently words. Spanish speakers use them all the time, and so will you if you learn Spanish. In fact, you already use them all the time, but in English.

Three Optimal Things

Three things about these words make them optimal first words to learn in Spanish:

  1. They are very frequently used.
  2. You already know them.
  3. You can focus exclusively on learning to pronounce them (since you already know them.)

Too good to be true? That was my first reaction when I created the list. As you’ll see, it’s more like “the time has finally come.”

Hiding in Plain Sight for Centuries

These words have been hiding in plain sight for centuries. They are perfect (285), and near-perfect (226), high-frequency English-Spanish cognates. That is, they have the same spelling and meaning in English and Spanish and are (very) frequency used in both languages.

What’s kept them hidden is not knowing which cognates (of thousands) are the most frequently used. All the words on the 500 Optimal First Words list are in the top 5000 most frequently used words in Spanish. And 277 of them are in the top 3000! That makes them pure gold for the student first learning Spanish.

To put that in perspective, you would understand ~90% of every word spoken or written in Spanish if you knew the top 3000 words. And, your comprehension would rise to 95% if you understood the top 5000 words.[1][2]

All this, and yet, for English speakers learning Spanish, it gets (much) better.

50% of the Top 5000 Words in Spanish are Cognates!

Yes, it’s true. English speakers who want to learn Spanish get a 50% head start on the most critical words in the language.

After learning that they exist, and how to pronounce them, English speakers can say plenty (in Spanish) after learning a bit of grammar. That’s a reversal of the common complaint of being made to learn grammar and having no vocabulary with which to say anything.

To get to 50%, the top cognate verbs must be included. Verbs make up 477 of these 2500 cognates in the top 50%. As in any language, you’ll have to learn how to use verbs. But, 477 of them will be words whose meaning you already understand.

Why Doesn’t Every Spanish Teacher Start with This List?

They probably will. But, until now, it’s been impossible to formulate such a list without a decent frequency dictionary.

There’ve been six efforts to create a Spanish frequency dictionary starting in 1927.[3] They all suffered from significant limitations before Mark Davies’ breakthrough version in 2006 (book title here). That was only 12 years ago.

It takes exposure and lots of time to incorporate new information into accepted pedagogy. To my knowledge, even online curriculum providers are just starting to integrate Davies’ work into their approach to teaching Spanish.

The Cost of Cognate Acquisition: Pronunciation

You already know what they mean, how to spell them, and how to pronounce them in English. But you can’t use them in Spanish until you can pronounce them in a way that a Spanish speaker can hear them. And you have to tune your ear so that you can hear and understand them when spoken in Spanish, as well.

English and Spanish share an almost identical alphabet. But Spanish is pronounced differently enough, that the same exact word (spelled the same, with the same meaning) is unlikely to be understood if you don’t pronounce it, correctly.

Listen to a Spanish Native Speaking Perfect English

If you don’t believe me about how important pronunciation is, (and have a smartphone or tablet) go to your settings and change your language to Spanish. Then, highlight an English sentence and have it read aloud to you by the Spanish voice (which uses the Spanish rules of pronunciation.)

Don’t be surprised when “Juan” or “Paulina,” says something incomprehensible. How could that be? You’ve highlighted a correctly written English sentence to be read aloud!? Yes, and you’re hearing how a native Spanish speaker would pronounce that English sentence using the Spanish rules of pronunciation. It sounds like gibberish to an English listener.

By the way, that’s the way you sound, in reverse, to Spanish speakers when you pronounce correctly written Spanish sentences using the English rules of pronunciation.

Same Words, Worlds Apart

When in Colombia on a recent trip and talking with my aunt (who only speaks Spanish) I was finally able to form perfect Spanish sentences and was excited to say something that involved the word ‘video.’ Imagine my surprise when she had no idea what I was talking about!

The problem? I pronounced ‘video’ like the English word that it is. In Spanish, ‘vidéo’ has an accent over the second syllable. Trust me when I tell you that ‘video’ and ‘vidéo’ mean the same thing, but are worlds apart when mispronounced from your listener’s point of view.

Unless each speaker adjusts their pronunciation to the listener’s language, even perfectly formed sentences using the same alphabet (In either English or Spanish) sound like gibberish!

We might remember this when tempted to criticize each other’s “accents.”

Perfect and Non-Perfect Cognates

285 words in the 500 Optimal First Words list are perfect cognates. They have the same meaning and are spelled the same, in English and Spanish. I’ve allowed for the Spanish accent mark placed over the same letter, e.g., mamá vs. mama, réplica vs. replica. I’ve also allowed for words spelled with two letters in English, ‘accessible,’ but only one letter in Spanish, ‘accesible.’

The 226 non-perfect cognates on the list allow for minor spelling changes such as replacing the ‘t’ with ‘c’ in ‘edición’ vs. ‘edition’ and ‘nacional’ vs. national. They also allow for an ‘o’ or ‘a’ after the word as in ‘humano’ vs. ‘human’ and ‘diferente’ vs. ‘different.’

It’s a rare (non-existent?) student who might be thrown off by the minor spelling changes I’ve allowed for in the ‘non-perfect’ portion of the list. I’ve kept it strict to enable the student to focus almost exclusively on pronunciation.

But What about Verbs & Grammar?

Cognates should come first. Every cognate you learn (to pronounce) in the top 5000 is pure gold! In fact, you rarely hear a Spanish sentence without one.

I’m teaching my children to go as far as they want with cognates until they’re ready for a change of subject or pace. Besides that, they are only 9 and 5 years old, and many of the cognates are words they are learning in English for the first time. That’s double points for homeschoolers!

Verb Cognates

There are 477 near-cognate Spanish verbs in the top 5000. But verb endings in the infinitive are “foreign” to the English ear, and more than two letters need be modified from their English counterpart. Therefore, the low-hanging fruit of noun and adjective cognates should come first, in my opinion. Only then can the student focus exclusively on pronunciation (crucial skill #1) and ear-training (crucial skill #2) from the start.

Grammar Madness

Putting grammar before words is demotivating. Why put students through a grammar lesson when they have no words with which to apply that grammar?

By learning cognates first, the student emerges with lots of words and excellent pronunciation.

The First 100

Here’s the first 100 of the 500 optimal first words list. Four words appear twice: once as a noun, and again as an adjective. The fact that these words (solo, final, presente, and total) appear twice in the top 5000 words makes them pure gold. Instead of being disappointed that they’re the same, celebrate them as getting two high-frequency words in one. But, just in case it makes you feel cheated, I’ve added four more to the list for a total of 104.

The First 100 Optimal First Words to Learn in Spanish
Word IPA Function Frequency
solo ’solo adv. 102
momento m.noun 108
solo ’solo adj. 160
problema m.noun 169
historia f.noun 192
idea i’ðea f.noun 193
familia faˈmi.lja f.noun 201
importante adj. 207
humano adj. 218
posible adj. 225
general xene’ɾal adj. 227
relación f.noun 230
situación f.noun 268
social so’θjal adj. 280
español adj. 285
final mf.noun 307
condición f.noun 341
color koˈloɾ m.noun 359
experiencia f.noun 361
diferente adj. 365
natural natu’ɾal adj. 414
atención f.noun 441
real re’al adj. 462
ocasión oka’sjon f.noun 463
favor fa’βoɾ m.noun 468
principal pɾinθi’pal adj. 496
animal a.niˈmal m.noun 497
base ’base f.noun 498
posición f.noun 503
nacional adj. 507
superior supe’ɾjor adj. 535
función f.noun 543
grave ’gɾaβe adj. 548
decisión deθi’sjon f.noun 549
música ˈmu.si.ka f.noun 550
expresión ekspɾe’sjon f.noun 555
producto m.noun 589
personal peɾ.soˈnal adj. 590
imposible im.poˈsi.βle adj. 592
plan ’plan m.noun 598
origen o.ɾiˈxen m.noun 606
interior in.te.ˈɾjoɾ m.noun 614
profesor pɾo.feˈsoɾ m-f.noun 621
total to’tal adj. 629
opinión o.piˈnjon f.noun 632
profesional pɾo.fe.sjoˈnal adj. 640
capital ka.pi.ˈtal mf.noun 651
material ma.teˈɾjal m.noun 656
simple ’simple adj. 661
normal noɾ’mal adj. 664
actual äk’twäl adj. 676
información f.noun 682
popular popu’laɾ adj. 709
error eˈroɾ m.noun 738
reunión rew’njon f.noun 746
final fi’nal mf.noun 771
civil θiˈβil adj. 774
doctor d̪okˈtor m-f.noun 778
construcción f.noun 794
presente m.noun 802
director di.ɾek’toɾ m-f.noun 816
radio ˈra.ðjo mf.noun 824
educación f.noun 845
operación f.noun 848
particular paɾtiku’laɾ adj. 854
solución f.noun 871
intención f.noun 876
control kon’tɾol m.noun 889
conversación f.noun 892
generación f.noun 906
visión bi’sjon f.noun 908
labor la’βoɾ f.noun 930
revolución f.noun 957
maestro ma’estɾo m.noun 961
plaza ’plaθa f.noun 1020
sensación f.noun 1023
obligación f.noun 1040
total to’tal m.noun 1043
región re.ˈxjon f.noun 1050
discusión dis.ku’sjon f.noun 1055
central θen.ˈtɾal adj. 1062
televisión te.le.βiˈsjon f.noun 1078
moral mo.ˈɾal adj. 1082
crisis ˈkɾi.sis f.noun 1085
presente m.noun 1088
sector sek’tor m.noun 1096
accidente m.noun 1098
oficial ofi’θjal adj. 1099
intelectual intelek’twal adj. 1103
institución f.noun 1115
conclusión konklu’sjon f.noun 1138
exterior eks.teˈɾioɾ adj. 1163
cámara ˈka.ma.ɾa f.noun 1172
creación f.noun 1173
internacional adj. 1189
original o.ɾi.xi’nal adj. 1191
profesión pɾofe’sjon f.noun 1206
honor o’noɾ m.noun 1211
organización f.noun 1243
café kaˈfe m.noun 1250
americano adj. 1261
interior in.te.ˈɾjoɾ m.noun 1263
cultural kul’tuɾal adj. 1277
hospital os.piˈtal m.noun 1298

Anki Deck with All 500 Words

I’ve made an Anki flashcard deck with all 500 words. Anki is a free digital flashcard program that enables the use of pictures, audio, video, and has lots of other great features to optimize recall. The cards can be viewed on a smartphone, tablet, or computer.

After you’ve viewed a card twice, Anki uses a spaced repetition algorithm to show you the card again at just the right time to optimize recall. This is called SRS or spaced repetition system and it was invented by Dr. Piotr Wozniak.

Each word in the 500 Optimal First Words deck has a picture, audio pronunciation in perfect Spanish, the IPA symbol, the function of the word, and its frequency rank in Spanish.

There are two cards for each word so they can be viewed forwards (Word on the front, picture and sound on the back) and backward (Picture on the front, word and sound on the back.)

These flashcards are suitable for anyone learning Spanish. The pictures are the best illustration of the word I could find and are also child-friendly. Here’s what the cards look like after both sides have been revealed.

Spanish Flashcard Cognate AnkiSpanish Flashcard Cognate Anki

Spanish Flashcard Cognate Anki Spanish Flashcard Cognate Anki

  1. Davies, Mark, 2006, A Frequency Dictionary of Modern Spanish, Routlegde: “Nation (1990) has shown that the 4,000–5,000 most frequent words account for up to 95 percent of a written text and the 1,000 most frequent words account for 85 percent of speech. While Nation’s results were for English, they do at least present the possibility that, by allowing frequency to be a general guide to vocabulary learning, one task facing learners – to acquire a lexicon which will serve them well on most occasions most of the time – could be achieved quite easily.”  ↩
  2. Nation, I. S. P. (1990), Teaching and learning vocabulary, Boston: Heinle and Heinle.  ↩
  3. There have been a number of other frequency dictionaries and lists for Spanish (Buchanan 1927, Eaton 1940, Rodríguez Bou 1952, García Hoz 1953, Juilland and Chang-Rodríguez 1964, Alameda and Cuetos 1995, Sebastián, Carreiras, and Cuetos 2000), but all of these suffer from significant limitations.  ↩
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Aventuras de un Papá Educando en el Hogar Parte 5: Tomando Vacaciones en un Idioma

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Nuestras vacaciones familiares este año son para Colombia, Sudamérica, para visitar a familiares y aprender español. Afortunadamente, nos quedamos con la familia todo el tiempo. Sin gastos de hotel, nuestro viaje de seis semanas costará poco más que un viaje a Florida.

Bienvenido A Colombia

En contraste con la imagen que la mayoría de los estadounidenses tienen de Colombia, dos tercios del país y todas las ciudades principales están en las montañas. Estamos hablando de grandes montañas cubiertas de nieve con retiros de cabañas de estilo suizo. Por ejemplo, la elevación del terreno en Bogotá es de 8.660 pies o 1/2 milla más alta que Denver. Aunque nuestra visita está más cerca del ecuador, todavía está en las montañas. Incluso cerca del ecuador, aquellos con los medios para vivir a mayor altitud pueden escapar del calor tropical.

Idioma y Familia

De todas las muchas razones para visitar Colombia, este viaje es sobre familia e idioma. Es hora de que nuestros muchachos readquieran el idioma español al que han estado expuestos desde su nacimiento. Eso les permitirá hablar con sus familiares mientras disfrutan de muchos otros beneficios de saber español.

Puntos de Partida

Mi esposa habla español e inglés perfecto sin acento detectable en ninguno de los idiomas. Sus padres tienen un acento en inglés, pero lo han estado hablando con fluidez durante décadas.

Como los padres de mi esposa viven con nosotros, nuestros hijos han estado expuestos al español y al inglés desde el momento en que nacieron. Como era de esperar, su discurso fue “retrasado”. Sin embargo, su español comenzó a desaparecer desde su primer día de escuela privada. Mi esposa y yo estamos ansiosos por traerlo a la superficie más pronto, en lugar de más tarde.

He incursionado en español desde la escuela secundaria y he podido viajar cómodamente en América Latina. Puedo leer español razonablemente bien, pero gran parte de eso se debe a la familiaridad con las raíces latinas y griegas. En cuanto a hablar el idioma, las ilusiones de fluidez desaparecen rápidamente entre los taxistas chilenos. No hace falta mucho esfuerzo para no entender una sola palabra en los últimos 30 segundos antes de darme cuenta de que no estoy hablando efectivamente con nadie.

Para ser justos, el español chileno y el argentino se hablan notablemente rápido y tienen muchos modismos. Pueden dejar desesperados incluso a hablantes nativos de español por una consonante bien definida o dos.

El Vínculo Débil, Padre o Ambos

Cuando se trata de hablar español, soy el eslabón débil de nuestra familia. No creo que eso importe tanto a los chicos si yo no fuera su padre. Por alguna razón, el lenguaje del padre parece tener un efecto más fuerte en el lenguaje de los niños que el de otros miembros de la familia. Por ejemplo, soy un lector voraz y mis amigos dicen que mi vocabulario (en inglés) se está extendiendo a los niños. Desafortunadamente, el hecho de que solo hable inglés en la casa también está contribuyendo a su falta de interés en el español. Por el contrario, el español perfecto que mi esposa y parientes políticos hablan continuamente no les está llegando a los muchachos.

La responsabilidad, por lo tanto, está en mí. Si quiero que los niños aprendan español, voy a tener que aprenderlo primero. Afortunadamente, he tenido un comienzo bastante largo y prolongado.

Cerrando el Laguna Inglés

Cuando mi esposa y parientes políticos hablan entre ellos, siempre es en español. Hablan inglés solo cuando estoy cerca. Los niños usan esto como una escapatoria para escapar de las dificultades de aprender español. Una de nuestras tácticas es cerrar esta laguna. Para hacer eso, papá necesita hablar español en la casa.

Alcanzar la Fluidez de la Base

Yo diría que la capacidad de llevar a cabo los asuntos cotidianos de la casa en español (solo) califica como fluidez básica. Los profesores de español dicen que esto requeriría ~ 2000 palabras de vocabulario, la capacidad de conjugar 10 verbos esenciales en el tiempo presente, pasado y futuro, y la comprensión de una lista relativamente corta de reglas gramaticales críticas. Sin embargo, dado que no estoy empezando de cero, me gustaría llevarlo un poco más allá.

Sobreaprendizaje

Me encantaría poder traducir mi escritura al español y, algún día, escribir en español. Usando el vocabulario en inglés como un indicador aproximado, conocer las 5000 palabras utilizadas con mayor frecuencia permite comprender ~ 95% del texto escrito.1

Nation (1990)2 ha demostrado que las 4,000-5,000 palabras más frecuentes representan hasta el 95 por ciento de un texto escrito y las 1,000 palabras más frecuentes representan el 85 por ciento del habla. Si bien los resultados de Nation fueron para inglés, al menos presentan la posibilidad de que, al permitir que la frecuencia sea una guía general para el aprendizaje del vocabulario, una tarea que enfrentan los estudiantes: adquirir un léxico que les sirva en la mayoría de las ocasiones la mayor parte del tiempo. podría lograrse con bastante facilidad.

Sería molesto no entender una de cada 20 palabras en inglés (95% de comprensión). Sin embargo, suponiendo que las mismas estadísticas se mantengan generalmente en español, estaría encantado de tener esa instalación con Español.

Para la perspectiva, el vocabulario para el porcentaje de comprensión del inglés se desarrolla de la siguiente manera:

1000 palabras: 85% del habla
2000 palabras: 92% del discurso
5000 palabras: 95% del texto escrito

La curva exponencial comienza en 1000 y se aplana en 5000 palabras. Estoy excediendo el objetivo de fluidez de base e intentando 5000 en este viaje. Teóricamente, eso me permite tener que buscar solo una palabra de las veinte al escribir o hacer traducciones entre inglés y español.

Espero aprender pronto (sentir y experimentar) cómo estas estimaciones resultan útiles para escribir, hablar y traducir. Sin duda, se necesitará una buena cantidad de gramática para desatar el poder de todas estas palabras nuevas.

Una ventaja de aumentar mis metas para la fluidez en español es que aprenderé en exceso el idioma necesario para las conversaciones en la casa. Incluso si lleva mucho tiempo alcanzar mis metas más altas, hablar en español por la casa para el beneficio de los niños será una brisa relativa. También me inclinaré menos a “hacer trampa” cuando esté bajo estrés para communicarme.

Primeros Pasos para Los Chicos

Mientras trabajo para cerrar el laguna inglés, les he dado a los niños una lista ilustrada de 625 de las palabras más usadas para aprender en español. En realidad, su abuelita les está ayudando a repasar la lista. Ella está haciendo que todo sea divertido y pronunciando cada palabra como un Colombiana nativa. Eso viene naturalmente a la abuelita porque ella es una Colombiana nativa.

  1. Davies, Mark, 2006, A frequency dictionary of modern Spanish, Routlegde ↩
  2. Nation, I. S. P. (1990), Teaching and learning vocabulary, Boston: Heinle and Heinle. ↩
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Colombia Language Vacation
Homeschooling

Adventures of a Homeschooling Dad Part 5: Taking a Language Vacation

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Our family vacation this year is to Colombia, South America, to visit relatives and learn Spanish. Thankfully, we’re staying with family the whole time. With no hotel expenses, our six-week trip will cost little more than a trip to Florida!

Bienvenido A Colombia

In contrast to the image most Americans have of Colombia, two-thirds of the country and all of the major cities are in the mountains. We’re talking big snow-covered mountains with Swiss-style chalet retreats. For example, the ground elevation in Bogota is 8,660 feet or 1/2 mile higher than Denver. Although our visit is closer to the equator, it’s still in the mountains. Even close to the equator, those with the means to live at higher altitudes can escape the tropical heat.

Language & Family

Of all the many reasons to visit Colombia, this trip is about family and language. It’s time for our boys to reacquire the Spanish language they’ve been exposed to since birth. That will enable them to talk with their relatives while enjoying many other benefits of knowing Spanish.

Starting Points

My wife speaks perfect Spanish and English with no detectable accent in either language. Her parents have an accent in Engish but have been speaking it fluently for decades.

Since my wife’s parents live with us, our sons have been exposed to Spanish and English from the time they were born. Their speech was predictably “delayed” as a result. However, their Spanish started to disappear from their first day of private school. My wife and I are keen to bring it back to the surface sooner, rather than later.

I’ve dabbled in Spanish since high-school and have been able to travel comfortably in Latin America. I can read Spanish reasonably well, but much of that is due to familiarity with Latin and Greek roots. As for actually speaking the language, illusions of fluency disappear quickly around Chilean taxi drivers. It doesn’t take many spurts of not understanding a single word for the last 30 seconds before realizing that I’m not effectively talking with anyone.

To be fair, Chilean and Argentinian Spanish are spoken notoriously fast and have lots of idioms. They can leave even native Spanish speakers desperate for a well-defined consonant or two.

The Weak Link, Father, or Both

When it comes to speaking Spanish, I’m the weak link in our family. I don’t think that would matter so much to the boys if I weren’t also their father. For some reason, the language of the father seems to have a stronger effect on the language of the children than that of other family members. For example, I’m a voracious reader and friends say my (English) vocabulary is spilling over to the boys. Unfortunately, the fact that I speak only English around the house is also contributing to their lack of interest in Spanish. In contrast, the perfect Spanish my wife and in-laws talk continually is not getting through to the boys.

The onus, therefore, is on me. If I want the boys to learn Spanish, I’m going to have to learn it first. Happily, I’ve had a rather long and drawn out headstart.

Closing the English Loophole

When my wife and in-laws talk to each other, it’s always in Spanish. They speak English only when I’m around. The boys use this as a loophole to escape the difficulties of learning Spanish. One of our tactics is to close this loophole. To do that, Dad needs to speak Spanish around the house.

Reaching Base Fluency

I’d say the ability to conduct everyday affairs around the house in Spanish (only) qualifies as base fluency. Spanish teachers say this would require ~2000 words of vocabulary, the ability to conjugate an essential 10 verbs into the present, past, and future tenses, and the grasp of a relatively short list of critical grammar rules. However, since I’m not starting from scratch, I’d like to take it a little further.

Overlearning

I would love to be able to translate my English writing into Spanish and, someday, write in Spanish. Using English vocabulary as a rough gauge, knowing the most frequently used 5000 words enables one to comprehend ~95% of written text.1

Nation (1990)2 has shown that the 4,000–5,000 most frequent words account for up to 95 percent of a written text and the 1,000 most frequent words account for 85 percent of speech. While Nation’s results were for English, they do at least present the possibility that, by allowing frequency to be a general guide to vocabulary learning, one task facing learners – to acquire a lexicon which will serve them well on most occasions most of the time – could be achieved quite easily.

It would be annoying to not understand one out of 20 English words (95% comprehension.) However, presuming the same stats hold generally true for Spanish, I’d be thrilled to have that facility with Español.

For perspective, the vocabulary to percentage comprehension of English breaks out as follows:

1000 Words: 85% of speech
2000 Words: 92% of speech
5000 Words: 95% of written text

The exponential curve starts at 1000 and flattens out at 5000 words. I’m overshooting the goal for base fluency and trying for 5000 on this trip. Theoretically, that well leave me only having to look up one word out of twenty when writing or doing translations between English and Spanish.

I hope to soon learn (feel, and experience) how these estimates pan out for writing, speaking, and translating. No doubt, a fair amount of grammar will be needed to unleash the power of all these new words.

An advantage to raising my goals for Spanish fluency is that I’ll be overlearning the language needed for conversations around the house. Even if it takes a long time to reach my higher goals, talking in Spanish around the house for the benefit of the kids will be a relative breeze. I’ll also be less inclined to “cheat” when under stress to communicate.

First Steps for the Boys

While I’m working to close the English loophole, I’ve given the kids an illustrated list of 625 of the most frequently used words to learn in Spanish. Actually, their abuelita is helping them go through the list. She is making everything fun and pronouncing every word like a native Colombiana. That comes naturally to abuelita because she is a native Colombiana.

  1. Davies, Mark, 2006, A frequency dictionary of modern Spanish, Routlegde ↩
  2. Nation, I. S. P. (1990), Teaching and learning vocabulary, Boston: Heinle and Heinle. ↩
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