Is Spanish hard to learn?

[Turkish]

Is it hard to learn? I was always told that once you know a foreign language, learning a 2nd one is a little, not much, but a little easier. True? Anyways, what's the hardest part of Spanish? Speaking? Understanding? Writing? Reading?

 

[JDrake]

Im learning it in school its real simple
however people are ignorant when they say english is the hardest language to learn.. theres so many more forms (subjunctive, respect tenses, etc) in spanish and stuff
edit: the hardest part is definatley understanding what someone is saying... reading/writing is easier

 

[her209]

Si senor.

 

[Pepsei]

i faked my way thru 3 years of spanish in high school and i didn't learn much.

 

[Kalvin00]

Originally posted by: joedrake
Im learning it in school its real simple
however people are ignorant when they say english is the hardest language to learn.. theres so many more forms (subjunctive, respect tenses, etc) in spanish and stuff
edit: the hardest part is definatley understanding what someone is saying... reading/writing is easier

Yep. I took 3 years of Spanish...I could write out what I wanted and maybe even talk to another person, but when they talked back to me, if they're not using simplified language its like...uhhhh....que?

 

[Chaotic42]

It depends on what you already know.

If you know French or Portugese or stuff like that, it would be easy. If you only know Cantonese, it would probably be hard.

In school I was always told that Russian is one of the hardest languages to learn, but I didn't have a problem with it. I'd say its pretty easy because its somewhat predictable.

 

[imported_LoKe]

Spanish is an easy second language. That's why it's taught in American schools.

*waits for someone to assault me.*

Kidding. I'd put it up there with French.

 

[tfinch2]

Originally posted by: Kalvin00

Originally posted by: joedrake
Im learning it in school its real simple
however people are ignorant when they say english is the hardest language to learn.. theres so many more forms (subjunctive, respect tenses, etc) in spanish and stuff
edit: the hardest part is definatley understanding what someone is saying... reading/writing is easier

Yep. I took 3 years of Spanish...I could write out what I wanted and maybe even talk to another person, but when they talked back to me, if they're not using simplified language its like...uhhhh....que?

I'm quite the opposite. I can understand really well, but when I speak it it takes like 30 seconds for each sentence.

 

[JDrake]

Originally posted by: tfinch2

Originally posted by: Kalvin00

Originally posted by: joedrake
Im learning it in school its real simple
however people are ignorant when they say english is the hardest language to learn.. theres so many more forms (subjunctive, respect tenses, etc) in spanish and stuff
edit: the hardest part is definatley understanding what someone is saying... reading/writing is easier

Yep. I took 3 years of Spanish...I could write out what I wanted and maybe even talk to another person, but when they talked back to me, if they're not using simplified language its like...uhhhh....que?

I'm quite the opposite. I can understand really well, but when I speak it it takes like 30 seconds for each sentence.

edit: understand words or what they are saying?

 

[Nutdotnet]

Originally posted by: tfinch2

Originally posted by: Kalvin00

Originally posted by: joedrake
Im learning it in school its real simple
however people are ignorant when they say english is the hardest language to learn.. theres so many more forms (subjunctive, respect tenses, etc) in spanish and stuff
edit: the hardest part is definatley understanding what someone is saying... reading/writing is easier

Yep. I took 3 years of Spanish...I could write out what I wanted and maybe even talk to another person, but when they talked back to me, if they're not using simplified language its like...uhhhh....que?

I'm quite the opposite. I can understand really well, but when I speak it it takes like 30 seconds for each sentence.

Same here. Understanding isn't hard, but writing and speaking it myself is very difficult.

 

[hdeck]

i made it through 4 years in high school and completely tested out of it at college, and still can't speak much at all.

 

[Turkish]

hmmm interesting responses, well as you can imagine, Turkish is my native language and I'd say that I am 98% fluent with English, and I have been learning German for the past 3 months (in germany) and will stay here till the end of March, so I think I will be able to have 70% fluency in German.

which country speaks the cleanest Spanish? Spain? I'd assume so but you never know...

the only sentence (with more than 5 words) i know in spanish is "la comida belize es una mierda" a sentence my friend from guatamela taught me

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: Turkish
hmmm interesting responses, well as you can imagine, Turkish is my native language and I'd say that I am 98% fluent with English, and I have been learning German for the past 3 months (in germany) and will stay here till the end of March, so I think I will be able to have 70% fluency in German.

which country speaks the cleanest Spanish? Spain? I'd assume so but you never know...

the only sentence (with more than 5 words) i know in spanish is "la comida belize es una mierda" a sentence my friend from guatamela taught me

Spain uses a second person plural Vosotros form that the Latin Amercian countries for whatever reason don't use. I was first taught Spanish by someone from Spain, so Mexicans and such sound weird when they speak Spanish.

 

[randumb]

compared to chinese, no

 

[yosuke188]

Originally posted by: randumb
compared to chinese, no

Compared to Japanese, no

 

[oboeguy]

Originally posted by: LoKe
Spanish is an easy second language. That's why it's taught in American schools.

*waits for someone to assault me.*

Kidding. I'd put it up there with French.

Spanish is pretty easy, IMO, compared to other languages. English speakers have to deal with the subjunctive and a few subtleties here and there but for the most part, it's not hard.

 

[jadinolf]

It must be easy. I heard little kids speaking it.

 

[Steve]

I took French from grades 4 thru 9, and again freshman year of college, and I still suck at it.

Buddy of mine OTOH, did really well at Spanish in college, and then took up French and did well at that too.

 

[igowerf]

Originally posted by: joedrake
Im learning it in school its real simple
however people are ignorant when they say english is the hardest language to learn.. theres so many more forms (subjunctive, respect tenses, etc) in spanish and stuff
edit: the hardest part is definatley understanding what someone is saying... reading/writing is easier

English is definitely one of the more difficult languages to learn. Germanic languages tend to be harder than Romance languages like Spanish and French, and it doesn't help that English is made up of figures of speech and words from just about every language out there.

English is EXTREMELY inconsistent in spelling, filled with homonyms, filled with phrases and words that all mean the same thing, has illogical grammar, etc., etc.

 

[CKent]

It's not too difficult. It, English, Portugese, French, German, etc. all have roots in Latin, so there are a lot of similarities. Knowing only English, and having learned & forgotten Spanish, I can often understand the gist of something written in French or German, for instance. Understanding it as spoken by native speakers was always a huge challenge for me though, at best I could almost follow along with stuff on the spanish channel. I think if you hear a native speaker a lot, understanding would come fairly easily. If you're taught it in schools, it's rare (if ever) you'll hear native speakers saying things they really might say... at most, something like "The ..... cat ..... is ..... here". Thus understanding is more difficult. Amusing, and not surprising, that schools teach foreign languages in such a manner as to make you able to pass a test on it rather than understand a native speaker.

 

[igowerf]

Originally posted by: yosuke188

Originally posted by: randumb
compared to chinese, no

Compared to Japanese, no

Sorry. Mandarin is more difficult than Japanese. Imagine if you had to write EVERYTHING in kanji.