Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM)

I found my language and communication experience to be totally enriching. I lived among 4 Spanish speaking people everyday, which enable me to pick up the language more quickly. A lot of students found it difficult to communicate with people on an administrative level, or on an intellectual level. I agree that this may be difficult at first, but after one month it should feel easier. At least for me it did. In the end it all boils down to you and your confidence level. You have trust what you know, and you have to have confidence in yourself as a good communicator in a second language. Once you get over this hump, everything starts to become more clear.

At first, when I arrived in Madrid I felt a little not at ease when talking to native speakers. I even did not have the courage to talk only when it was compulsory. After the second day I started to feel confident and talk fluently and without any fear..the most helpful experience in learning a foreign language is to live among her native speakers for a while, to interact as much as possible and not to be afraid of making mistakes when you talk. Who does not make mistakes does not learn :)

I came to Spain fed up with six years of trying to learn Spanish in a class room setting. Madrid´s aggressive social atmosphere and congenial character of the few natives I befriended right off provided the perfect setting to hone my conversational skills. As far as I have come in the last four months, I look forward to overcoming remaining language barriers by the end of my stay in July. Upon my return, I will continue to pursue fluency in Spanish and daily practice using the language.

Having had studied for 4 years Spanish in highschool , when I arrived, I did understand much of what was being said. But the big problem was tot try to express myself. Hopefully, I lived with Spanish speakers and did not meet any French-speakers , which "condemed" me to speak it at all moments of the day. After a few months, thanks to these 2 factors and the classes being carried out in Spanish, I got much at ease in this language. It has been a wonderful experience to learn a language in this way.

Spanish is exciting to learn aside from the fact that you have about millions of them speaking the language. It´s not difficult to communicate with Spaniards either so long as you know the present and past tenses. It takes practice, speaking and listening, to master it. The key is to have spanish friends to keep you talking and thinking in their terms. At first, it was confusing but as you get along, it´s like communicating in your native language.

At first I had problems understanding the Madrilenans due to the speed at which they spoke, but being all day in that language (classes, roommates, TV, shopping), I started very fast to be able to cath the words and understand whatever they were talking about. At the end of my stay, I could have a totally normal fluid converstaion with spanish people, which hasn't been the case for ohter Eramus students I've met, who were living among foreigners...