Improve Your Understanding of Spanish With Lupa
When I tried to learn Spanish, everyone told me to listen to Radio Ambulante . This is an NPR Spanish-language show that aims to bring the depth of long journalism to the world of podcasts. And that’s great, but I could never understand what everyone is talking about.
Now there is hope. The show has teamed up with the creators of a new language learning app to launch a new app: Lupa . Lupa won’t teach you Spanish from scratch – other apps like Duolingo are still the best starting point for beginners – but its goal is to teach you how to listen.
The app plays stories in the style of Radio Ambulante as you read the transcript. Numerous functions help you adjust the difficulty level: to make listening easier, you can slow down the sound. You can switch between the Spanish transcription and its English translation. You can click certain words to see their meaning, and those words are added to a vocabulary list that you can study later.
But you can also decrease your confidence in transcribing as your ear learns to pick up on what the audio track is recording. For example, there is a view that hides some words in a transcript, and a parameter that controls whether the view hides “difficult points” (words spoken quickly or with a strong accent). You are encouraged to listen to each section of the story several times before moving on.
The app is free for iOS and Android and consists of two stories. Once you’ve worked them through, you’ll need a subscription ($ 10 per month) to access the rest.