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One of the greatest things about Madrid it´s that you can find, all kind of museums where you can find valuable information about Madrid and Spain´s history.

If you want to know more about Spain and Madrid, visiting a Museum might be a good idea.

Top 5 museums in Madrid

1. Museo del Prado
2. Museo Thyseen-Bornemisza
3. Centro de Arte Reina Sofia
4. Museo de América
5. Museo Cerralbo

Those are just the “most famous museums”, for example The Prado Museum is one of the most important art museums in Europe and amongst the best in the world. There, you may find sculptures, art objects, paintings and much more.

museo del prado

Less known museums in Madrid

Madrid is a huge city, and there are some museums that don’t get all the attention they deserve. Two clear examples of this are the following museums:

1. Museo Angel Nieto: In this museum you can find all about motorcycling. The museum has tons of pictures, trophies, medals, helmets, etc. Angel Nieto was a multi-time Grand Prix motorcycle roadracing World Champion. He is considered a national hero in Spain. If you like the speed and the motorcycles, you should definitely visit this Museum

2. Museo de Areonáutica y Astronáutica: Hands down, one of the most interesting museums in Madrid. In this museum you can find all the information about the history of aviation. It´s located here: Carretera A-5, km 10,500. 28071 Madrid

Country of origin: Austria

Occupation: Student  /Intern

My experience with Language4Students: My name is Mario and I am Austrian guy who did his internship in Madrid at Robert Bosch. Besides my internship I decided to improve my Spanish skills and chose Language4Students for that. I was really satisfied with the program we did, all the staff was very friendly and I learned a lot there! It was actually really great fun and I went to the classes with great ambition. My Spanish teacher was the best teacher I ever had…and besides this there was always a friendly and amicable relation between the students and staff and we also had sometimes a drink together after the classes. From my point of view, I can strongly recommend this language school in the centre of Madrid!

My experience with the language school „Language4Students” was excellent. During my internship I had very little leisure time. Fortunately my Spanish teacher was very flexible referring to change the schedule.

The level of my class was exactly what I have searched for. Furthermore I enjoyed that my class never had more than 5 students.

3 hours of class per weak is a great opportunity to improve grammar knowledge and to chat away in everyday language.

I really can recommend this language school, especially for the ones who make an internship and are looking for classes in the evening.

Best regards,

Stefan

One of the most important things  to memorize once you are in a foreign country are those words or phrases that you can use to express courtesy and respect.

You should memorize these right away:

• Please: Por favor (por fah BOR)
• Thank you: Gracias (GRAH-s’yahs)
• You’re welcome: De nada (deh NAH-thah)
• Excuse me: Disculpe (dees-KOOL-peh)
• I’m sorry: Lo siento (loh S’YEN-toh)

Pronouncing the vowels correctly is essential to authentic Spanish pronunciation and, therefore, to communication.

Spanish Vowels tend to sound shorter than english vowels. There is a little tip to obtain clipped vowels: You can add an h (silent h, not pronounced) after a, e and o. By doing this, you get ah, eh, oh.

The spanish vowels e and u, can be represented by “ee” and “oo”.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/n_s_p/2889722862/

This can be a little confusing at first, so let’s check some examples. The spanish words sábado (Saturday), libro (Book) and computadora (Computer) are trnascribed as “sah-bah-doh”, “lee-bro” and “khom-poo-tah-doh-ra”.

Pronouncing Spanish Vowels

Below, you can find individual examples for each vowel:

• ‘a’: The spanish a is pronounced like the “a” in the English word “father”.
  • Example: terraza (teh-rrah-sah)
• ‘e’: The spanish e is pronounced like a shortened version of the “e” in the English word “cafe”.
  • Example: Mesa (meh-sah)
• ‘i’: The spanish i is pronounced like the “ee” in the English word “see”.
  • Example: silla (see-yah)
• ‘o’: The spanish o is pronounced like the “o” in the English word “obey” (but it is clipped short).
  • Example: no (noh)
• ‘u’: The spanish u is pronounced like the “u” in the English word “rule”.
  • Example: azul (ah-sool)

Searching and surfing in youtube, we found some interesting videos of celebrities that speak spanish. Some are really good, and others, well they at least try to speak spanish!

• Jennifer Aniston (Friends):

Our Comments: Ok, it was just a sentence, but it was really funny.

• Dakota Fanning

Our Comments: Dakota learned spanish through personal classes, and because of the movie “Men in fire” which she started. It´s impressive the way she speaks spanish.

• Gwyneth Paltrow

Our comments: Gwyneth gives a full interview in Spanish, she speaks fluently and with no problems at all.

• Kyle Minogue

During her concert in Madrid she gave this short speach in spanish. It wasn´t very fluent and clear, although it was nice to see her trying to speak in spanish.

• Hilary Clinton

There always seems to be a misunderstanding about the pronunciation of the ‘h’ in Spanish.

In this post, we are going to give a detailed and quick guide to pronouncing the letter ‘h’ in Spanish (or, to be more precise, not pronouncing it).

The reality is that the ‘H’ in Spanish is always silent.

So, for example, the word “hay” is pronounced like the English word eye.

How to pronounce the ‘h’ in Spanish:

Honduras is pronounced onduras
And Havana is pronounced avana

It is confusing at first, but it just like the letter ‘k’ in English: You write ‘know’, but you don’t pronounce the letter.

Wait for more quick pronunciation tips here at language4students.

choosing an spanish academy

We get asked this question a lot of times, and most of the times our answer is: ‘It depends’.

It depends on how well you grasp language in general. There are some aspects of the language that make it a little bit harder than English, for example placing verbs in the right form, knowing where to put the adjectives, masculine and feminine words, etc.

Overall, you need to stay dedicated if you decide to learn Spanish.

We don´t want to be too biased, but finding a good Spanish academy is vital for your learning experience. And of course, language4students is an excellent choice if you are looking for Spanish classes in Madrid.

If you go to an academy that doesn´t provide you some basic stuff, then learning Spanish can indeed be a difficult task. What ‘stuff’ are we talking about? For example, take this checklist with you and review it when looking for a Spanish academy:

• They give you the opportunity to take part in realistic Spanish conversations.
• Small groups of people
• Native teachers is always a plus
• Fun and dynamic classes

Those are just some points that you need to be aware of to make Spanish an easier language to learn.

Find those in an academy, and we guarantee you that learning Spanish won´t be hard at all.

Get to know us better! If you live in Madrid, please come and visit us, call us or leave us a message at our contact form.

First time I heard from a friend about Language4students. In my first week in Madrid I decided to go with her once to see what the school is like. There was no problem in “just looking” for the first time.

Stephanie Michel

Everybody in the school was very friendly, the atmosphere was nice and so I decided to start there, too. There was no problem to start in the same group with my friend, because we were nearly on the same level.

We were a small group about 6 people, later just 4, which was very good, because like that I learned a lot. I really liked to go there two times a week, because our teacher was very friendly and funny and she always asked what we would like to learn and in what topics we are interested in. Like that I upgraded my grammar skills and learned at the same time a lot about Madrid and the people who live there.

Besides learning it was always funny and I got to know nice people. I would like to say “thanks” to everybody and can just recommend this language school.

So you‘ve been learning Spanish for a while, now what? You want to make it official.
The process is simple… Take the DELE Exam.

What is DELE exam?
The DELE is the official Diploma of Spanish as a Foreign Language, given through the Instituto Cervantes in the name of Spain’s Ministry of Education. It certifies your abilities and competencies with Spanish tongue. The Universidad de Salamanca is the organization in charge of preparing the exams, assessment of the results, and giving the final grades for the exams.
http://diplomas.cervantes.es/general/descripcion.jsp

Which are the levels for the DELE Exam?
There are different levels according to the students’ knowledge of Spanish.

• Level A1- certifies that the student knows basic Spanish to understand and use daily expressions enough to satisfy basic needs.
• Level B1 (Inicial) – This level accredits sufficient knowledge of the language to understand and react in situations which require an elementary use of the language, also to communicate wishes and needs.
• Level B2 (Intermedio) – Accredits Linguistic competency to communicate in ordinary daily situations which do not require specialized knowledge of the language.
• Level C2 (Superior)- This level accredits higher linguistic competencies , enough to communicate in situations which require an extensive knowledge of the tongue and the cultural habits.

When do the DELE exams take place?
Every year the Instituto Cervantes fixes the dates of the exams, for 2009 these are the dates of the exams in Spain:

1. May: 15th exam. Inscription: from March 2nd to April 24th
2. August: 21st exam. Inscription: from July 13th to July 31st
3. November: 13th exam. Inscription: from September 1st to October 16th

How can I get ready for the DELE exam?
In Language4Students we have developed special courses for you to prepare for the DELE exam in the best possible way. We have classes to review all contents that will be tested in each level. And we make them flexible for you; according to you needs we will give you the right amount of hours you need; 12, 24, 48 hours specially dedicated to DELE exams. These classes can be taken individually or in mini groups. You can begin any time of the year, any week.

How can I enrol for the preparation Classes DELE?
The process is very easy; just send us an email to: info@language4students.com. We will e mail a skill test, and as soon as one of our teachers has graded it we will let you know when you can begin.

How much will it cost?
The fees for these courses depend on the amount of hours you need, and the kind of group you want. For more information check our price list at the very end.