I moved to Puerto Rico at 32. I didn't really speak any Spanish, though I had a few years of it in high school. So I had some familiarity with the grammar. Nearly a decade later, I consider myself fluent, though I know at times I sound funny to native speakers.
PR turned out to be an exceptionally difficult place to learn Spanish (for why, see: http://www.speakinglatino.com/study-spanish-in-puerto-rico/ particularly #2). It took me longer than it would have taken had I gone somewhere that English was not an option, and my biggest jumps forward were on business trips to those places.
When I arrived, I started taking lessons twice a week, and continued that for about 18 months. I spoke Spanish almost exclusively for work, usually over the phone, which is much harder and likely helped. A few years in, I moved to Miami, where I actually speak more Spanish at times (here, social situations are in Spanish, in PR all social interactions were in English) Later, I married an Argentine, and found out that I had to learn a whole other language!
Other things I did that helped:
1- I decided I was going to say dumb things, and that I had to be okay with that. When someone would point something out, I'd laugh. An example, I remember mixing up the words for 'butterfly' and slang roughly equivilent to 'faggot' in American English. I didn't know that's what it meant. I had heard the word somewhere and associated it with butterfly because they sound somewhat similar. Be ready to laugh at yourself, that makes it much easier to just throw it out there and try. And let's be honest, pointing at a butterfly and saying, "Hey look at the faggot" with no other context or offensive intent is pretty funny.
2- Find people to speak with regularly. Daily if you can. The really valuable people are those who will correct you without switching to your language unless absolutely necessary.
3- Focus on communicating, not grammar. You need enough grammar to be understood, and you should keep correcting it when you make mistakes, but if you work on communicating effectively with people, the grammar falls into place.
4- Have fun with it! Its interesting. Enjoy.
5- Learn the bad words too. I used an offensive word above. But its important to learn those words, because that's how people actually converse. You'll learn whole other levels of both language and culture by doing so. Sometimes, its important to realize when someone is being offensive, or even that you're being offensive and don't know it.
PR turned out to be an exceptionally difficult place to learn Spanish (for why, see: http://www.speakinglatino.com/study-spanish-in-puerto-rico/ particularly #2). It took me longer than it would have taken had I gone somewhere that English was not an option, and my biggest jumps forward were on business trips to those places.
When I arrived, I started taking lessons twice a week, and continued that for about 18 months. I spoke Spanish almost exclusively for work, usually over the phone, which is much harder and likely helped. A few years in, I moved to Miami, where I actually speak more Spanish at times (here, social situations are in Spanish, in PR all social interactions were in English) Later, I married an Argentine, and found out that I had to learn a whole other language!
Other things I did that helped:
1- I decided I was going to say dumb things, and that I had to be okay with that. When someone would point something out, I'd laugh. An example, I remember mixing up the words for 'butterfly' and slang roughly equivilent to 'faggot' in American English. I didn't know that's what it meant. I had heard the word somewhere and associated it with butterfly because they sound somewhat similar. Be ready to laugh at yourself, that makes it much easier to just throw it out there and try. And let's be honest, pointing at a butterfly and saying, "Hey look at the faggot" with no other context or offensive intent is pretty funny. 2- Find people to speak with regularly. Daily if you can. The really valuable people are those who will correct you without switching to your language unless absolutely necessary. 3- Focus on communicating, not grammar. You need enough grammar to be understood, and you should keep correcting it when you make mistakes, but if you work on communicating effectively with people, the grammar falls into place. 4- Have fun with it! Its interesting. Enjoy. 5- Learn the bad words too. I used an offensive word above. But its important to learn those words, because that's how people actually converse. You'll learn whole other levels of both language and culture by doing so. Sometimes, its important to realize when someone is being offensive, or even that you're being offensive and don't know it.
But mostly, have fun with it.