Lesson One: Hacer Cucharita

Bueno,entonces... lesson one, complete!

So, this has got to be the most unique approach to language learning I’ve encountered thus far. It is really, really funny. Let’s introduce our two main players:



David: He is the gringo who came to Buenos Aires to learn Spanish and found a job on Craigslist (holla!) to make language videos in a recording studio. He’s quick, witty, and relentlessly tries to integrate some sort of sexual conversation into the Spanish lesson.

Jimena: She is the patient, patient Spanish teacher. She is Argentine, and does a fabulous job of 1) Encouraging David in his attempts to speak, even if he is incorrect, and 2) Speaks Spanish the entire time. She is extremely professional and does an excellent job of keeping David on track.

Today’s lesson covered the areas of greeting someone, introducing oneself, nationalities, the alphabet, basics for learning verbs, masculine/feminine, and a million other things in between. I know, it sounds like a bit much for a first lesson, but I think it works because I genuinely became immersed in the program. Verbs, nouns, fem/masc endings, etc., are all color-coded, and there are arrows that help one remember that the verb is in past/future tense. There is also a little Argentine flag that pops up when the word or term is unique to Argentina. My eyes and ears and kept busy the entire time, and the dialogue between Jimena and David is often interrupted by the little profe guy teaching us something new, so my brain has to keep changing gears and I never zone out.

So, what did I like the most? I would have to say the back and forth between Jimena and David. Honestly, the 40 minutes flew by because I was actually entertained the entire time. I love the section where Jimena is teaching David nationalities (so he can hacer cucharita with girls from all Spanish-speaking countries) and Jimena says, “Soy argentina.” David responds with, “You are the country? That’s a bit presumptuous.” It’s this sort of banter that makes the program interesting—nothing sounds terribly rehearsed, it is not tired dialogue, and it’s the closest thing, in my opinion, that you can get to being in a class.

And that was only lesson one. I used Bueno, entonces... in my computer but it's also available for the iPhone, check this out:

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