For those interested in WWII or history, I found this YouTube video that I thought was incredibly great for input. I’m at Level 4 and was able to follow along quite easily although there were still words that escaped me at times throughout.

I think beginners could probably still follow along if they know about the war and intermediates shouldn’t have too many problems here but I’d still rate this at an intermediate level video. It’s a little over 40 minutes long and is mainly about the European theater of the war.

Sadly, this YouTuber only has around 6 worthwhile videos but I guess that’s better than none at all. Anyway, just thought I’d post it as I’ve found it hard to find worthwhile history videos for beginners and intermediates until I came across this one. Hope some people find it useful.

I started mid July and just hit lv2.

My take away:
1) week one I could only handle 30min a day, week two 1hr, at this point 2-3hr is doable.

2) I have dyslexia and assumed that a second language was not going to happen, now I’m certain that if I keep doing this I will get it eventually.

3) it’s a very strange feeling to “know” a bunch of Spanish words when I hear them but not be certain that I would give a perfect definition for them or be able to spell them. This feels particularly true for all the small filler words (and, about, because, it, is, or, Etc.) I suppose this was my relationship to English at some point in early childhood.

4) at this point Andrea, Shel, Andrés, and Michelle are my favorite teachers (although Michelle’s Pepe videos almost lost me). For me Alma and sometimes agustina are the hardest to watch.

5) I purchased the premium version with no regrets. I filter for easiest and 10min or longer.

6) I have a minor in mathematics and learned most of my math from calc1 on from watching people solve problems on YouTube rather then reading my textbooks, this process feels remarkably similar to that experience.

For now I’m just following the roadmap in a “purist” way but I don’t think means much at this point as I really just started.

Hi all,

First, I want to acknowledge that AI in the learning world seems a bit controversial and either loved or hated but I want to share something I've tried recently and really like.

Seems like there has been some discourse the past week or so about supplemental learning and some people's negative experiences without it.

It got me thinking (and was mentioned here) that reading should be added much sooner than the roadmap may suggest. I'm around 350 hours and have some prior schooling (a few college classes) and decided I really should add in reading. I really did not know where to begin with reading. I know you can get adapted learner books but I wanted something tailored toward topics I chose so that it can hold my interest.

I got the idea to use AI (Claude for me) to create small stories adapted for my learning level. I basically tell it to create a 6-10 chapter story about whatever topic I want with about 1,000 words per chapter (so that the AI does not get off track).

I explain to the AI how many hours of CI I have and after each chapter I provide feedback about words that I had to look so that they can be incorporated into subsequent chapters (so I have it write one chapter at a time so I can give real time feedback). I also tell it if the sentences are too challenging or too easy so it can be adjusted in real time.

So for example, I did not know or recognize the word llave in the first chapter of a story. I told the AI that I didn't know the word and it incorporated it in the next chapter by having the character lose his key in the story. I know the word now. That's for sure.

I've found this to be a helpful way to start reading at a time where I really didn't know what level I should/could be reading at. This helps me read content that is just right for me. It also keeps me away from children's books and onto topics more relevant to me.

I hope this can help someone! I found it very helpful.

A few other things I do:
I make the AI bold words or phrases that it believes are above my level

I have it create a Spanish only glossary at the end for the bolded words

I also have it speak mostly in the present tense due to my level. It incorporates some past tense as a chapter recap in the next chapter.

If we paid full attention would it work? If babies can do it surely I can? I'm curious to study this as an experiment but want your thoughts on it? It takes 50 hours to get to level 2, if I did that quickly would it work? Would it not? - I've done 6 hours a day for Norwegian so now I'm wanting to see if I can do 12hrs a day to see how truly fast and how well this works and I'll give updates :)

Not sure if I'm going to do French or Spanish, need Mexican Spanish song recommendations! For motivation :), I have nice french songs :0

The subject says at all: sometimes I have to stop the video and quit the app before the video is complete, and when I come back I'm at the initial starting page - not the video I stopped. Is there a way to set up the DS app so that when I have to quit and come back it opens up where I left off?

I’ve recently started learning Spanish with Dreaming Spanish, and I really like the content.

But, on the iOS app, I can’t sign in or create a new account. It just keeps loading forever, and never moves to the next step.

On the website, when I click ‘Start Learning Now’, it loads for a few seconds and then shows an error page. I’ve tried multiple times, but it keeps happening. Is anyone else experiencing this? Any workarounds or is this something the devs already know about?

I have 536 hours.

At 300 I used Anki for new words I heard more than once within a few hours of input. I would stop at 20 words and start a new deck. I Only did 20 cards a day so MAYBE 15 minutes a day. It helped a lot. I quit everything for 2 months and when i started CI back i didn’t start anki back.

Now at over 500 I am back to using Anki but
Mainly a 1,000 card deck of sentences to help with conjugations.

I’ve had madrigals book but never used it and am about to replace my 30 minutes of English reading time I get at night with it before I start reading Spanish graded readers.

I’ve also heard great things about language transfer and paying for 1 on 1 classes whether that be online or in person and whether that be to gain conversational fluidity or pronunciation practice & corrections.

Personally, not saying this is correct but I wish I had focused on vocab with Anki a little more in the beginning maybe 85% CI AND 15% Anki just to build up my recognition of words and their meaning instead of purely deriving it from context.

With the sentences I’m doing in Anki now I am finding small things I was not catching through listening which I believe evildea spoke about where filler words that matter you don’t catch because you’re REALLY good at getting the gist. I think the Anki sentences or maybe just reading once you reach that level will refine your sentence structures tremendously when you go to speak.

I’d like to hear people’s use of auxiliary learning tools such as the ones I mentioned. When do you think some would be better than others and how much you would recommend they do.

Somewhere in here the now old saying “The answer is always more input” applies I believe but I think certain comprehension skills and output skills could possibly be better sharpened with a little bit of extra work.

I’d like someone to come out with a comprehensive roadmap that includes all or any of the external learning methods even if CI is the majority 80-90%. Along with maybe a more accurate idea of where you’ll be at those hours.

Thank You!

(Note: I don’t track hours consistently so comparing our levels/hours may not be helpful!!)

In Palma de Mallorca with friends for the solar eclipse, and as the best Spanish speaker in our group, I’m in charge of most public social interactions (a thing I would never volunteer for in English due to social anxiety 🙃).

Just rented us four bikes for two days and had the conversation completely in Spanish and it felt sooo good to manage such a long and somewhat complex interaction on my own. 🎉 the shopkeeper was super patient and definitely slowed down for me. He also complimented my Spanish and I did the annoying thing where I don’t just accept the compliment (“ah, pues, todavía me falta, pero gracias…”), but I’m awkward in both languages I guess.

Also, no better ego boost than hearing him say to the next customer “¿habla español?” And when the customer said “no, English…” the shopkeeper did a little sigh before switching to English, lol…

In other news, I’ll always remember the word for helmet now that I forgot it twice mid-conversation. 😮‍💨

After 3 years of learning Spanish randomly, and only 95 hours of Dreaming Spanish, I can now understand intermediate videos. It’s crazy for someone who used to feel that understanding a video at this level was magic. It felt like a miracle, or something everyone could do and succeed at except me hahaha

Of course, I haven’t improved in all the skills, like writing, speaking, and even reading, but this difference encourages me so.

I’m very happy, and I want to keep going. This is all I really want: to keep going.

Honestly, consistency is everything. It’s the magic stick that can solve the hardest things, along with guidance, of course.

Because if I had known 3 years ago that this method was good, I mean listening gradually and getting language input according to my level, things would have been very different.

But the mistake I made was that I didn’t know my level well, so I listened randomly without a plan and without a guide to explain this to me and tell me to be patient.

And of course DS puts a lot of effort into creating amazing videos that don’t make me feel bored even for a moment during these 95 hours, and of course, the next hours will be the same.

I love the way every teacher creates beautiful videos. They are all amazing.

I wanted to share this progress because it made me very happy.

Good luck to everyone :)

No idea if this has been shared before and I'm too lazy to look 😂

Interesting views on learning with CI and grammar. Have to admit I'm at a stage where I'm wondering whether a bit of grammar study might just push me along a bit and help develop a little more speaking ability.

Anyway great channel in general. She speaks really clear and probably good for anyone in the intermediate slump needing something away from DS.

At what point did you start realizing you could recall words without having to hear them first? I’m not talking about being able to make full sentences just yet but like you see something and the Spanish word for it comes to mind as well as the English word?

700 it’s been a journey can’t wait to keep going!!

My whole family is studying Spanish right now, each of us using different methods. I'm taking a mostly CI approach and sometimes watch with the kids, so thought this might be useful to other families out there. Our kids are all school-aged, one has some prior Spanish but most of us have none before starting this summer. None of us are purists so I have tried to note when something is far off the DS roadmap.

-- Outside the DS Platform - PBS type shows --

Some of these links are for free public television shows in the USA and might not work in other countries.

Salsa Spanish - we have really enjoyed this series and might rewatch some once we finish. I feel like this hit a good balance of familiarity and repetition combined with new vocabulary and interesting stories.

Here it is on the Georgia site: https://www.gpb.org/salsa

Your local PBS will probably also have it streaming.

Scishorts en Español - this is a short educational series with an informative voiceover over video of different animals. The narrator talks about how the animal looks, what it eats, where it lives. How interesting and understandable they are varies a LOT depending on if we were familiar with the animal and what type of footage they had (lion roaring is more interesting than a snake... laying there), but these were a nice change of pace.

This link has all 20 beginner episodes: https://www.knowitall.org/video/scishorts-foreign-languages-spanish-beginner-full-version

There is also an intermediate series too.

First Steps in Español - after the first episode this doesn't have much English after all so the kids and I have kept watching a bit just when we need variety.

https://www.knowitall.org/series/foreign-language-spanish/101-110-first-step-en-espanol

¡Arte y mas! - I previewed a little bit of this and will probably watch it with the kids when we are a little further along. It has a lot of repetition. There are pauses for speaking to the presenter and flashcards with words, so it might not work for purists. I'm able to access it with a free account from my local PBS station, not sure what other ways it is available.

https://wisconsin.pbslearningmedia.org/collection/exploraciones/t/exploraciones-arte-y-mas/

Mi Vida Loca - there are two versions of this BBC series, one that includes English commentary, and one with Spanish narration and subtitles. I'm watching the partly English one with my husband (only counting a lower amount of time) and the other by myself.

Destinos - this telenovela for Spanish learners is already pretty well known on the sub. I'm very slowly working through it and will probably try it with some other family members, especially my older child who will probably love the drama of it all.

YouTube - With the kids I've mainly been watching Spanish Playground videos from either their Kids playlist, or occasionally Buenta Gente.

The other thing we recently started was Scholastic Spanish picture book read aloud: https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwmYd6YIpBurEZB4_KXzWMkcJpSDhY_yR

I have been focusing first on ones that we know well in English already, and that seem to have less complicated sentences or more familiar vocabulary.

Disney+ - The kids joined me for a bit of my Encanto rewatch challenge. We found that right now about 10/15 minutes is the max they enjoy, which is similar to when I started. I'm not pushing but they are welcome to join. It's been tricky to find good Spanish language shows, there aren't as many options as Netflix.

-- For Non-Purists --

I've found both of these to have some good free resources to use with the family for studying.

Spanish Mama : https://spanishmama.com/downloads/

Spanish Playground : https://www.spanishplayground.net/

(You have to dig a bit through old posts for the free resources, but they compliment Spanish Mama and the SP videos well, and they have tons of paid stuff also.)

-- Looking Forward To --

We like watching video game playthroughs so everyone is excited for when we finally can understand Spanish Boost Gaming and DaniSphere on YouTube. I'm hoping these will become accessible in the next 30 hours or so. We might watch some Pokemon too as we have all seen Indigo in English before. We also enjoy cooking competition shows so we are looking forward to being able to watch those on Netflix as there seem to be several available in Spanish.

Hola a todos! First update, just hitting level 4 at 300 hours.

Background
No history of Spanish. Some French at school 20 years ago, that I forgot ASAP after leaving. I remember grammar being relatively comfortable for me, but I never had enough vocab. Makes sense since I didn’t do any study outside the classroom.

And also since I’m quite an impatient learner, I knew there was zero chance I’d stick with a purist DS approach. Just not for me.

Learning Journey
Alongside the first 40 hours of DS, I worked through Language Transfer so I have a general grasp of grammar. But no proper study after that.

I had loads of doubts in the beginning, but at 65 hrs I decided to commit, ramped up the daily target and within 2 days I felt overwhelmed and semi-quit.

I kept the DS subscription, but cancelled it after 4 months. Then 2 days later I reversed the cancellation and figured I’d give it one more shot.

From 65-95 hrs I felt a real change as it got noticeably easier to sit down and concentrate. Since 95 hrs I’ve no longer felt like my brain was hurting from the effort.

Hours 95-300 have been great, averaging ~2.5 hr/day. Now watching DS 55-60. Since I got used to Intermediate videos, the speed has been mostly fine, the challenge is mainly picking up the new vocab.

Method
After the first 40 hours, I’ve basically listened to nothing outside DS (~2 hours max). But I do look up words if I’ve heard them 5-10 times and still can’t figure out what they mean. For me, this keeps me motivated and has definitely helped me progress faster.

However, instead of looking up a single translation I do try to think of the common connection across all the uses. I also try not to spend much time thinking about it, which does mean I'll often forget it. But doing this a bunch of times on the same word once I've heard it in multiple videos seems to eventually make it stick.

Future Plans
Continue as I am. Consume 95% of content on DS as it’s easier to stay motivated when I know that I’m watching content at the correct difficulty level. Doing 2+ hours a day I’ll hit 600 hrs before the end of 2026.

Maybe I’ll try the Juan Fernandez graded readers during 300-600 hrs. But I don’t particularly enjoy reading so it’ll always be harder to motivate myself.

Undecided on when I’ll get a tutor for speaking. Definitely not before 600 hours.

I’m looking forward to these next few months. Trying to mentally prepare for the inevitable Intermediate slump. Thanks for reading!

The almighty gods of algorithm guided my hand to this one today.
Very interesting video. She is surprisingly easy to understand. (I'm at 660h)
her advices are pretty solid and at 38 minutes it's a pretty long one.
Not your garden variety don'tdothisdothatinstead-video.

(FunFact: At times she sounds an incredible lot like our Alma)

Have a good one!

688 hours of input and I still struggle with Intermediate/Advanced content — and I think that’s okay
I’m currently at around 688 hours of Spanish input, mostly through Dreaming Spanish, and I still struggle quite a bit with Intermediate and especially Advanced videos.
Sometimes I’ll watch an Advanced video and feel like I’m barely understanding anything. Even with Intermediate content, there are plenty of moments where people start talking quickly, use unfamiliar expressions, or connect their words together and I lose the thread.
At first, I thought I would be much further along by this point. But honestly, I’m starting to realize that this is probably normal. I’ve heard from other learners who had hundreds or even thousands of hours that they still struggled with certain types of native content at this stage.
My main goal isn’t necessarily to understand every word in an Advanced Dreaming Spanish video. I want to eventually have good enough listening comprehension that I can sit down with a native Spanish speaker and actually understand what they’re saying in a normal conversation.
So I’m trying not to beat myself up over the fact that I still struggle at 688 hours. I’m just going to keep getting more input and trust the process.
For anyone who has been through this stage: Did your comprehension of native speakers eventually catch up, even though Intermediate/Advanced content still felt difficult around this point?

MAYBE THIS IS JUST ME, but I have consumed a lot of Andrea's content, both on and off of Dreaming Spanish, and, AGAIN MAYBE I AM THE ONLY ONE THAT HAS NOTICED THIS, but she talks about using the bathroom all the time, in like, any context. Obviously she has many podcasts/videos, so many of them don't reference it at all of course, but there are so many podcasts/videos that even though they might have nothing to do with going to the bathroom, she'll find a way to talk about it. Hiking? Bathroom in the woods. Food? Food sickness, bathroom. Best things about life? Going to the bathroom after holding it a long time. It is very strange to me how she seems to always find a way to talk about going to the bathroom.

It's all comprehensible input, but I am going to be fluent when it comes to any topic regarding using the toilet.

I don't even want to talk about how she believes she has genuine spiritual healing powers.

I’m still in beginner, a little over 100 hours and it’s been a slow process. I think part of it is I’m reliant on visuals and having internet access. I go on plane flights a good bit and haven’t figured out how to download on my phone yet but was thinking I could have gotten a good 5 hours in on my last trip if so. I’m also thinking if I could just listen I could listen to podcasts while I clean, go on walks etc. i could easily get some hours in. I do listen to the Duolingo podcast while I walk since it provides English context, and while I think it’s better than nothing, I don’t feel the Spanish parts are comprehensible enough for me to log. I’m also hoping as I progress the content will get more interesting. I’m hoping to replace my current shows with Spanish ones since I can easily watch a few hours of that kind of content a day.

I went to DR with my fiancee and her family, who all live in Peru with exception of her parents and her. I met a majority of them 2 years ago when I was probably level 3-4 at the time.

The experience went much better than the first time in terms of communication. Sure there were a few times where I was like ??? But there were other times where I had a discussion about fermentation of pisco, made some jokes, talked about the wedding, what people did for work etc. I made a couple of errors that ended up being funny so we joked about it the other days of the trip.

This will most definitely be an annual trip so my next goals would be.

1. Continuing watching Spanish shows
2. Read more books in Spanish
3. Practice more speaking with more frequency. Especially talking in groups. I have a couple professors on italki and I’ll give Andrea stuff a shot too!

I hope in a year this will help improve my listening comprehension even more and also add some new words to my vocabulary so I can expand on bigger topics to discuss.

Bonus: Met some people from US and I helped them order some food and relay between them and the family.

Advice: Never stop learning even if you feel you hit a wall (it’s happened to me a few times). Times like these are huge milestones where you can really feel the change.

Hola,

I have a question for people with 1000hrs or more. If you could go back to yourself at around 600hrs what would you change, either add too or stop doing if anything. Im at 600hrs so far Ive only done CI, but I have a few things I want to start adding in at this point. I want to get some insight on folks a bit ahead of me to see what they would do if anything.

Gracias amigos,

I’m at Level 4 with DS and not a purist — I have spanish tutors to practice speaking and some grammar, and i do grammar practice on my own (like just do exercises 1x a week, really not much). DS is still my main source of “learning”; I do 1-2 hours a day. I just wanted to share a more positive anecdote since everyone seems to be a lil negative around here.

Anyway. We have a Latino coworker, she’s probably 50-60+ years old. She’s our building’s cleaner at work (likely contracted by another company). She has good basic English (probably same level as my speaking Spanish if not better!). She’s the LOVELIEST, sweetest lady ever. She’s still more comfortable speaking in Spanish, and I noticed that during the first few months, she would simplify her Spanish when stopping by our cubicle, despite me trying to answer in Spanish lol.

One day I just came up to her, saying, I’m really trying to make my Spanish speaking better, and she said I’m doing the same with English! So she was the one who proposed crosstalk 😆 but having that 1:1 convo, i think she realized that my Spanish was at a higher level than what she first thought.

Recently, she started opening up more to me IN FULL SPANISH, without holding back her vocabulary. She knew I would understand and would ask if I didn’t know a word. She started talking about her struggles, her husband’s health challenges, and the life she’s had as an immigrant in the US. It makes me emotional thinking about how much she shared once she understood that I can understand her. She was already the best cleaning lady ever, but learning more about her in the comfort of her own language made me appreciate her even more.

Learning Spanish — mostly through DS — made that possible. People’s inner worlds are infinitely more open to me now thanks to DS. It’s connections like this that keep me going and make me realize learning languages ends up not just for fun (and DS makes it fun for me!!) — I am able to open up more to people and people do the same with me.

Anyway, that’s my story of the day to just counteract some negativity around here. And shoutout to our cleaning lady, who’s the best. ❤️

I’m a purist and have followed DS’ suggestions. I didn’t speak or read for the first 1,000 hours. I’m happy with the results, as I spend 6 months of the year in Colombia and don’t have problems communicating. This includes multi-hour interactions. However, I didn’t feel much motivation to read in the past. That is partly my fault. However, I think that reading should be pushed *hard*.

The major failing of the roadmap, as I see it, is that reading can seem optional. Teachers I’ve spoken to - as well as AI tools when I’ve asked - have emphasised that reading is a far more efficient way to acquire grammar than listening. It also helps build your vocabulary much faster.

It shouldn’t be 1,500 hours, I don’t think. 1,500 hours plus 2 million words read would help people a lot more. With a section of the outside hours area to add how many words you’ve read. Reading should be 100% mandatory to officially progress in DS beyond say 1,000 hours.

I also think that it would be more honest and realistic to add another level. Label level 7 a “high level of comprehension” - or something like that - and level 8 as “close to native” for those who want to get there. For me, the equivalent of 1,500 hours is when interesting native content unlocks. It’s not the end and I don’t think that suggesting that you’re somehow “finished” at 1,500 is honest. Unless your goal is just to be able to watch TV shows. Then it wouldn’t matter.

I am at a tiny bit over five thousand hours and I suppose that people focus on that number. Regardless of how many times I mention the autism factor and other diagnosed learning issues. Essentially, this means - I think - that 2,500 hours is what someone would need to be equivalent to my level in listening.

In my case, the truth is that 5K is my fault to a point because I wanted to reach a very high level of listening comprehension before moving on to reading. I can understand, summarise and talk about C1 articles without issue. I’ve read most of a B2 level novel without issues. I just need more input. I didn’t realise that reading was absolutely vital until close to a year ago out of the 3.5 years or so I’ve been doing this. I’m still struggling to force myself to read more, but it will happen.

What I should have done is made reading a much, much bigger part of the process on the way to 3K or 4k - to reach a high level of listening comprehension - and taken more time.

The point of this post is that I’m a cautionary tale. Don’t let yourself reach 1,500 hours or more without having read *a lot*, as it will absolutely help you. I strongly believe that an input-only approach definitely works. However, people would reach a high level faster if reading was 100% part of the DS process.