This is just an example of how languages work. When studying two languages at the same time, you need to go beyond the literal translation and keep in mind the differences and nuances of each language. Not only will  you learn these new languages faster finding many similar words, but also going the extra mile will take you further ahead. 

There are 3 groups of verbs in Spanish: group 1 - transitive verbs (can only accept direct objects), group 2 - intransitive verbs (no direct object required), and group 3 - verbs that can be both transitive and intransitive. Let's take a look at the difference between transitive and intransitive verbs.

• Transitive verbs require a direct object.

Example: Escucho música todos los días.
                  * Escuchar (to listen) requires a direct object (música).
Always remember to answer the question what? or who? when you want to know if a verb is transitive.
                  ¿Qué escucho? Escucho música.
                  ¿A quién esucho? Esucho a Juan.

• Intransitive verbs do not require a direct object to make sense.

Examples: El cielo brilla.
                   Yo trabajo.
                   El agua corre.

Well, subjunctive it's just expressing ideals or imaginary situations.
Example: I wish you were here.
The use of subjunctive in the Romance languages such as Italian, French, Spanish and Portuguese is very common. People use it for wishes, requests, to express emotional states, doubtful and hypothetical situations.
- Me gustaría que estuvieras aquí (Spanish) 
- Vorrei che tu fossi qui (Italian)
- J'aimerais que vous soyez ici (French)
_ Gostaria que você estivesse aqui (Portuguese)

We often ask ourselves this question, specially if it's difficult for us to learn a new language. The truth is that in order to learn either English, French, Italian, Spanish or Chinese one has to consider the following:

1. It's essential to study grammar. One is required to know grammatical rules in order to properly speak the new language.

2. You need to practice day in and day out what you learn. Repetition is an efficient learning tool.

3. Keep a journal for the new language you are learning, then write complete sentences about basic ideas like your daily routine, activities future plans and short term goals.

4. Listen to the language as much as possible, either by listening to podcasts, the radio, watching television or just music, etc.
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5. It's very important to read, gradually start by reading short stories, tales for children, and eventually, move on to reading more complex literature.

When deciding what your child will be doing this summer it's important to think about the benefits of learning a new language. Whether you want him/her to practice conversation or review grammar, he or she can definitely benefit from a Summer Language Camp. Not only children will be learning new vocabulary, but they will also be immersing themselves into a new language. They will speak Spanish, French, Chinese or the language of choice the very first day and after six weeks of intensive language classes you can see the results. I encourage to consider our Summer Language Camp for your children. ¡Buena Suerte!  Bonne Chance!  祝你好运！(Zhù nǐ hǎo yùn!)

When learning a new language, we come across a special category of words called cognates. Two questions come to our minds: what are they and how important is it for us to know them?

In linguistics the word cognate means "descended or borrowed from the same earlier form". Examples of cognate languages are French, Spanish and Italian that descended from Latin, or Scandinavian languages such as Norwegian, Swedish, Danish that descended from an earlier form of a North Germanic dialect. The English language (as part of the Germanic family) shares words with other Germanic languages. Also, one third of the language is based on Latin; therefore, English shares words with Spanish and French. Here are some examples: similar, radio, television, patio, singular, plural, popular (true cognate words with Spanish);  revenue, reservoir, avenue, boulevard, abstention, parent, partial (cognate words with French). 

Cognate words help us learn new vocabulary, but we have to be careful in making the distinction between true and false cognates. True cognates are words with identical spelling and similar meanings, while false cognates are words with similar spelling but different meanings. For example the French word inhabité is translated in English as "uninhabited", while the English word inhabited is translated in French as "habité". In Spanish, the word atender means "to assist" and asistir means "to attend".

Cognates are very useful, whether they are true or false. The truth is that you can learn the new language faster and boost your vocabulary just by learning the similarities and differences of words of your own language and your target language.

Muchos de nosotros nos hacemos esta pregunta a menudo sobre todo si nos cuesta aprender un nuevo idioma. ¿Cómo puedo aprender un nuevo idioma? La verdad es que para aprender ya sea inglés, francés, italiano o chino hay que considerar lo siguiente:

1. Estudiar grámatica es esencial e inevitable. Se requiere conocer las reglas gramaticales para hablar el idioma apropiadamente.
2. Practicar lo aprendido constantemente. La repetición es un método de aprendizaje muy eficaz.
3. Escribir un diario en el nuevo idioma comezando por ideas básicas sobre nuestros quehaceres diarios y siguiendo con oraciones completas sobre nuestros planes o metas a corto plazo.
4. Escuchar el idioma lo más que se pueda, ya sea por el radio, la televisión, escuchar música, etc.
5. Es muy importante leer, hay que comenzar de manera simple con cuentos cortos, cuentos para niños y seguir con lecturas cada vez más avanzadas. Todo claro de manera gradual y constante.

¡No olvide que la práctica hace al maestro!