raeonshades

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positivity

like or reblog if u save it

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i just walked past 2 construction dudes and one of em just said “i don’t think they’re right-handed or left-handed. they’re just dogs.”

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I’m not gay but I think Dwayne Johnson could give a mean shoulder massage.

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my clothes: *has a bunch of words and shit about how youre supposed to wash em right on the tag*

me: .. youre fabric go in the robot sink

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‘My Hijab Has Nothing To Do With Oppression. It’s A Feminist Statement’

Not all Muslim women cover their bodies. Not all Muslim women who do are forced to do so. Like freelance writer Hanna Yusuf, who chooses to wear a hijab in a daily act of feminism. In a new video for The Guardian, Yusuf challenges stereotypes by setting out to reclaim the choice to wear a hijab as “a feminist statement.”

For more on on how the hijab helps women reclaim their bodies watch the full video here.

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Literature: clever lies which secretly say the truth.

Simone de Beauvoir. (via mysharona1987)

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what does turkish delight taste like and is it worth the events that occurred in chronicle of narnia: the lion the witch and the wardrobe

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So I found this caterpillar on my way to class

We’re bros

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i honestly am tired of constantly telling myself “just get through this week and everything will be ok” like !!! i want everything to be ok 24/7 365 100% of the time im TIRED!!!!!!! 

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Harambe is like a real-life version of “Lil Sebastian”

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my kink is when ppl actually care abt my feelings & what I have to say

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hey, please replace ‘i wasn’t good enough’ with ‘it wasn’t right for me’ in your thinking. everyone’s talents and brilliance are differently placed, and if you’ve ever felt like you ‘weren’t enough’ for something, it just means it wasn’t right for you. there’s a place, position, person out there that you’re perfect for, and the only thing you’ve ““failed at”” is finding it yet.

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Reblog this picture of me holding a Family Size box of Honey Nut Cheerios? I’d really appreciate it.

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instead of arguing whether pineapples should be on pizzas or not, we should all stand united in order to combat the real evil which is sparkling water

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Basically, I have been learning spanish for the past three years in high school, but I only began to take it seriously this past march. I love this language and all its diversity and I want to share that love with this community. I am only B1 as of now, but I would love to share how I learned spanish outside of the classroom and what could work for anyone else learning spanish! I am a person who enjoys going towards a concrete goal….that doesn’t mean you need to do any or all of things I list….  I hope you enjoy! xoxo | If you want to know my full history with Spanish, check out my about page! chiazo.tumblr.com/sobre

I have decided to divide this post into skills I think are necessary to enjoy Spanish and how I work on these skills or am going to work on these skills. These are things that work for me!

Vocab

I hate learning vocab in a formal way, like Anki, because it reminds me of schools and tests and I hate feeling like learning spanish is something like a chore. Here are ways to make it feel like it’s not such a chore.

- Duolingo & Memrise

Duolingo does a better job in immersing vocab into other activities so it feels less tedious but both Duolingo and Memrise do a good job of teaching vocab. You can even use Memrise to review Duolingo’s vocab. I suggest taking advantage of the leaderboards and streaks on both these apps; keeping my Duolingo streak is what kept my motivation up before I really committed to practicing daily!

After finishing my duolingo tree, I am now doing the reverse tree: english for spanish speakers. It reinforces what you learned. You can also just review Duolingo vocab by keeping your skills gold or going on Memrise & using this course: http://www.memrise.com/course/342610/duolingo-spanish-vocabulary-in-progress/

Learn words from frequency lists or the most common words in Spanish. I’m doing this Memrise course right now: http://www.memrise.com/course/737/first-5000-words-of-spanish/

- Netflix

Watching netflix in spanish is a way I pick up on some new words. Here are some good shows.

House of Cards

Daredevil

Jessica Jones

How to Get Away With Murder

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

Orange is the New Black

Velvet

Grand Hotel

(ANY NETFLIX ORIGINALS)

if you don’t have netflix, check out Telemundo’s youtube channel and watch novels with subtitles!

- Songs

Listen to music in Spanish and then look up the lyrics and translate words you don’t know. Then sing the song again with this new knowledge of what you’re singing! I love Julieta Venegas so I dedicated a whole page to her in my spanish journal and I wrote down all the vocab from her songs that I didn’t know. Here’s a link to my Bomb Spanish Songs playlist on Spotify!

Grammar

I am obsessed with grammar because it was something I could wrap my head around in spanish easily and I saw it everywhere. Frequency really is key with learning a language. Here’s what helped because we never really focused on it in class:

- StudySpanish.com

This site is really good and in depth! I didn’t go on the site. Instead, I downloaded the app Spanish Grammar, available on Android, which has the site preloaded onto it. Even better, you don’t need internet to review so I read this on my way to school!

- SpanishChecker.com

This site is amazing because you can practice your writing. What’s amazing is that it highlights any possible grammar issues and offers an explanation for what it thinks is wrong, which is amazing. It is like StudySpanish in real time. I really love it!

- Memrise Grammar Course

I am currently using this Memrise course to practice my grammar further: http://www.memrise.com/course/153170/learn-spanish-grammar/

Okay, so now I’ll go over what I am trying to do or what I have done to work on each of the four parts of language learning: reading/leer, speaking/hablar, listening/escuchar, y writing/escribir.

LEER

putting spanish subtitles on so I am reading while I watch either a movie or tv show.

buy spanish books at cheap book stores that are for elementary school kids. i am going to try to read a certain amount of pages each day.

following blogs from the spanish side of tumblr. this way there are posts completely in spanish on my feed!

using readlang so I can easily read and translate vocab I don’t know. the flashcard feature is amazing! if you don’t like reading online, I suggest skimming through your books in spanish for vocab you don’t know before you start reading or using context clues.

HelloTalk is great for reading messages sent to you in spanish!

HABLAR

Use the app HelloTalk to speak with natives through your phone! I love how easy it is to find people and you can choose people from latin america or spain! it’s great way to be corrected and to help others learn your native language. 

Record yourself speaking! I did this everyday for the whole month of May and it was really great to see myself improve by watching the videos.

Speak with natives! I speak with my friend in spanish as well as her family. Also, sometimes I just talk to myself in spanish or yell at my family members in spanish because I know they won’t understand jajaja

Join my spanish skype group!!! I am waiting for more people to join before it begins but I am super excited. It would be a great way to speak with people from tumblr and meet others :) Just fill out this form

Sing songs out loud along with the artist!!!! This way you can work on your pronunciation while having fun!

ESCRIBIR

Start a language journal and start writing. It doesn’t have to be long but at least a sentence a day! (if you want an example, just message me and I can show you mine!)

try writing a post in spanish on here! or even make comments on a post in spanish or put your tags in spanish!

write on http://spanishchecker.com/en/ and you’ll be able to get explanations for your mistakes!

Use HelloTalk to send messages to others in spanish and you’ll be corrected too!

Lang-8 is a nice place to be corrected by posting journal entries. I slightly prefer spanishchecker.com because you get explanations for what was wrong while people tend to just correct you on lang-8 with no explanation. But to each their own!

ESCUCHAR

Watch Spanish Youtubers! I suggest watching spanish vloggers because you’ll get a new video everyday. Someone I really like is Ruthi San! She is a native spanish speaker living in Japan and she speaks primarily in Spanish but also in Japanese! Her family is so cute and she is awesome!

Music!!!!! I really suggest listening to Julieta Venegas for both beginners and well…EVERYONE! She speaks clearly and has a beautiful message in all her songs. They are very catchy. Check her out, she is my fav!

Netflix!! Start out with Spanish audio with your native language’s subtitles. Eventually work your way up to no subtitles. This is something I struggle with because I feel like I am missing something. Don’t worry! If you missed something, go back and put on subtitles. Another option is Spanish subtitles before you turn off subtitles all together. Do whatever makes you comfortable but try to challenge yourself!

Es todo! Gracias por leer lo que escribo. Buena suerte en tu propio viaje!