Have you ever found yourself just so damn frustrated with your progress in Spanish? Maybe you’ve decided to take the plunge and sit for an official D.E.L.E exam and now the nerves are building. The D.E.L.E. exams are the most widely recognised Spanish language qualifications in the world. To put it short- if you want to add “I speak Spanish” on your CV, that means having a DELE. Today we give you 5 key tips for preparing for DELE
1.Set Yourself Goals:
TOP TIP! Setting goals helps you focus and setting a time limit helps you keep that focus. Setting a hard deadline is an important first step. Be realistic – if you can’t put in the time needed to adequately prepare, don’t pay to do the exam.
CultureAlley is an online platform with interactive Spanish lessons, and fun vocabulary tools that sets a daily task plan and achievable goals for you. It has the most fun way to help you master Spanish vocabulary. CultureAlley lets you learn Spanish vocabulary while your browse your own Facebook newsfeed. It progressively replaces a few words from English to Spanish and provides you with their pronunciation and meaning . It provides 1 important lesson, and 1 practice game session everyday to help you learn a little Spanish everyday and sends your daily reminders for the tasks waiting for that day!
2. DO Find the right materials
The first thing to do is check out the DELE Cervantes website and look at some of the past exams. This will help you to familiarize yourself with the different levels, and based on that you can decide which level exam you want to write. It should come as no surprise that there are books made especially for the exam, much like the standard GRE or LSAT books.
And if you are looking for a free effective resource online, then you can find about 70+ lessons with CultureAlley covering grammar, conversations, vocabulary, lessons with native (Spanish) voice-overs, and practice exercises with fun games. CultureAlley covers all the domains required for language learning,i.e: reading,writing,listening,and speaking.
3.DO consider taking a course
Doing simple google search for DELE courses nets hundreds of places to get exam prep, both online and in person. Most are costly (around 300€), but come with the practice book and tips to doing the exam. You can’t study completely on your own so you should consider hiring a Spanish teacher to help you with the writing and speaking part of the exam.
For hiring a good experienced tutor for 1-1 on coaching with native tutors who can mentor and guide through DELE preparation, you can book classes with CultureAlley. You just have to mail your query to contact@culturealley.com, and we will provide you with the tutor profiles and we can book your sessions!
4.DO practice writing prompts like crazy
The writing section is a large part of the DELE, consisting of two parts: in the first, you’ll be asked to pick one of two options regarding a formal letter or email. It’s important to know formal salutations, advanced vocabulary and to include all of the parts asked for in the prompt. The second part is more personal, and you’ll have to choose between three different prompts. These could be about personal opinions, experiences or anecdotes. Keep in mind you will have 60 minutes for brainstorming, drafting and re-writing your two pieces of 150-200 words in pen. Your pieces should also be clear. Practice with your clock ALWAYS.
5.DO practice outside of the book:
Make sure that while you study the academic side of Spanish you continue to practice outside of class in the informal ways (watching TV, listening to music,speaking to local people) – it will take you from “classroom Spanish” to really using it as a second language. On the writing and speaking sections, and general knowledge of Hispanic culture is 100% important, as is being able to listen to different accents. The exam may call for you to read a quote and take a stance on it, talk about the economic crisis or the necessary knowledge of the language to allow communication in everyday situations.
CultureAlley helps learners to learn outside of courseware from daily conversations as learners can listen to the native pronunciation while learning vocabulary on the Facebook. A few relevant words on the Facebook feeds are converted into the language one wants to learn and one can listen to its pronunciation for better understanding as often as they want. You can listen to them, play games on them, practice your accent, and more! It helps one to speak Spanish fluently, and master the vocabulary and pronunciation just by logging into their Facebook account with CultureAlley. You also get over 70+ free audio-visual lessons to build your basic concepts.
