How to speak Spanish without freezing (my strategy)

If you freeze every time you try to speak Spanish, you don't need to study more. What you need is to practice fluency. That's why now I'm going to show you a very small change to start speaking more fluently right now, without studying further, and we're going to practice it together using a technique called 5-2-5. Many people believe that fluency means knowing a large number of words and having very advanced grammar. But that's not how it works. Fluency means being able to keep going even when you don't have the right word. even if you cannot use a certain grammatical structure. For example, if you don't know the word knife, instead of getting stuck trying to find the word knife, Do you think or do you simply say what you use to cut vegetables in the kitchen? Or if the word squirrel doesn't come to mind, You're trying to describe what you see through the window and don't know that word. Don't freeze up; just say the little animal that lives in trees and hides food. It basically means not letting yourself be blocked by an unknown word. because the ability to describe is far more valuable than knowing any individual word because it's impossible for you to know all the words, and even if you know a word, Sometimes it doesn't work when you need it. That is why the ability to describe and the ability to paraphrase are extremely valuable skills. So think of it this way. Paraphrase, don't stop. Paraphrase, don't stop. To describe, not to stop. Improving vocabulary and grammar will be done at another time. If you want to train fluency, Focus on conveying the message, even if you don't have the perfect word. But I know that all this is easier said than done, So let's practice it together. I have here a PDF I created that gives me a lot of questions I can use. It also gives me phrases I can use when I feel a bit stuck to help me describe. And what I'm going to do is choose a question from this list. A very, very easy question. A question about a topic I know very well. A question that I know would not be difficult, one that includes words and vocabulary that are familiar. Because once again, the goal here is not to learn new vocabulary or practice new grammar. The goal is to express myself with what I already have. And the exercise, as I mentioned earlier, is called 5-2-5 and has three steps. Write, read, and speak. We write, then analyze by reading what we have written, and then we speak. We're going to do the first step, which is writing continuously for 5 minutes about the question we chose. In my case, it's: Do you like cooking? What can you prepare well? Do you like cooking? What do you know how to prepare well? I'm going to write for five minutes without stopping. And when I come across a word that doesn't come to me, My only goal is not to get stuck on that word. and find, stray a bit, and find another way to say the same thing. Okay, I just wrote for 5 minutes, and the next part is analysis. It's good to read what I wrote and give myself feedback. Give me feedback on myself. Self-assess. Because if I can notice that I wrote "yo dijo" instead of "yo dije" It is much more likely that next time he will not repeat that same mistake. Being able to self-evaluate is a very, very valuable practice. So for this step, I only want to point out one or two things to improve. Now we move on to the final step, which is speaking. Again without stopping. We respond to the same question as before, which was Do you like cooking? What do you know how to prepare well? In my case, that was the question I answered in writing. Now I'm not going to read what I wrote. I'm going to set aside the text I wrote And I'm going to set the stopwatch for another 5 minutes And I'm going to keep talking endlessly about the same topic, answering the same question. Once again, the goal is to find another way of saying things that don't come out right for me. Keep going forward when I come across difficult words and find another way to say it in simple Spanish. So if I don't come up with a word, I don't stop; I describe it. I believe this is the most valuable skill we can develop as Spanish students. The ability to keep communicating even when we don't have all the words. That is why I recommend dedicating a large part, an important part of your learning to this practice of fluency. Actively practice this skill of communicating Don't worry so much about having all the words perfect. But what we saw here now is just a part. It's the fluency in expressing yourself, in speaking. There is also another aspect, which is fluency when listening. In this video, I'll also help you understand it more smoothly.