I'm considering signing up for iTalki. I like they they don't rope people into a long subscription.
What suggestions or advice do you have?
Would you recommend the service? I'd love to hear your thoughts.
I'm not ready for long books in Spanish. In Worlds Across sessions, I discovered that reading articles works well for me! We read from news sources and Nat Geo in Spanish.
What other resources are out there for articles (not books!!) in Spanish?
I want to share what I wish I had done differently with WA in case it helps others. You may want to do this another way, and that's valid.
I wish I had known they would test me on certain abilities and that these had been communicated to me from day one.
A few times, tutors had me read literature and then answer questions about it without being able to refer back to the literature. This felt more like a memorization test than a way to learn more Spanish. Later, when other tutors did the same, I just said in English that I did not want to do memorization-based tasks.
In one of the worst sessions I had, a tutor showed me a bunch of Spanish expressions. They then removed my ability to see / read the expressions and had me look at faces and pictures (one of crumpled paper??) and I was supposed to know which expression (which I had not memorized since I had just seen each for the first time) would apply to which photo. The comments about me to the coach were that I did not have a handle on this. lol
If I'd known what would be on the test to the next level, I would have focused on that the entire time instead of random exercises like "increasing vocabulary about the pharmacy," which I can do on my own.
When it came to learning the imperative, I wish the tutor had NOT told me it was not important and "never" used except if his mom gave him an order. I believed him but then was told months later I needed to know the imperative for the test.
Overall, I enjoyed my time with WA, and I learned a lot. But, I think their process could be improved.
I had to roll through several unskilled tutors who can't teach to find the excellent ones who help me move forward and know that you don't expect students to memorize things in 15 minutes.
Yeah. Not cool. He lost me at "weird Dominican lady."
If you can't pay $8/month, stealing (and being racist) is not the answer. I hope the mods here take action against people asking others to provide DS for free since that would be stealing.