I have a question for you. What do you do when you’re surrounded by people speaking Spanish?

 

A) Do you pay attention?

B) Do you just hear a buzz around you?

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If you answered A, congratulations, you don’t need to carry on reading. :) If you answered B, don’t worry about it, you’re not alone. It’s pretty common for any one learning a foreign language “to switch off”. The reason being is that you assume you’re not going to understand a thing of what people say, and so you don’t even bother trying to gather the meaning.

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How to improve your Spanish listening skills 

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#1 Decide when you’ll be doing some active listening

If you live in a Spanish speaking country, think of your daily activities. If, for instance, you go to the bakers every morning, or take a bus every day, you may want to choose those particular occasions to tune into Spanish. I’m not suggesting that you listen to any private conversation. Still, there is nothing wrong about taking notice of what a lady is ordering at the bakers; or listening to a mum in a bus asking her daughter to hold her hand.

 

If you don’t live in a Spanish speaking country, you can listen to Spanish podcasts. The main thing is that do it on a regular basis.

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# 2 Avoid any distraction

Silence, or put away you’re your mobile.

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#3 Decide how long for you’re going to do active listening.

It’s better to foccus for just 5 minutes, than getting your attention diverted and loosing tracks of what it is said when being surrounded by Spanish speakers.

 

# 4 Repeating mentally the words

Repeating mentally what you hear will help you focus your attention on what the person is saying.