Are dialogues in Spanish a good resource for you?
And where can you find some of those to use in your learning time?
No doubt, if you’ve been to Spanish lessons, you’ve probably come across dialogues.
They’re such a common language learning tool!
I even used them when I was learning to speak English, and it was one of my favorite activities to learn the language.
The time I spent doing that was crucial to get to the level I got today. It helped me:
- Improve my skills to understand native speakers.
- And to learn to express me like a native.
But, what about you?
Can you use dialogues in Spanish to improve your skills as I did with my English?
Of course, you can!
In this article, you’ll learn why you should be listening to dialogues to improve your Spanish.
Also, I’ll share with you a couple of good resources I found online so you can find dialogues in Spanish that are useful.
Affiliate Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links which means that if there’s a link to a product I recommend, and you decide to purchase it, I’ll get a commission at no extra cost to you.
Can dialogue in Spanish help you make progress in this language?
Yes!
Dialogues in Spanish expose your brain to a natural and conversational way of talking in this language.
If you hear them, you’ll be listening to:
- A conversational rhythm for speaking.
- Vocabulary people use every day.
- How native speakers express themselves.
- A natural intonation to use in conversations.
- The accent of native speakers.
And, based on my experience learning English, I can suggest that whatever dialogue you use to learn Spanish contains:
- An audio version.
- And a transcription.
It would be more powerful and beneficial for you.
Why?
Because when native speakers have dialogues in Spanish, they tend to mispronounce the words, shorten them, or even used slang, and idioms.
Also, it’s bound to happen that you’ll stumble with unknown words, and if you have the transcription, you’ll have the option to:
- Stop the dialogue.
- Look up the meaning of whatever you don’t understand.
- Take notes.
This reminds me of an interview I was hearing back when I was trying to learn English.
There was going to be a music festival in my city, and one of my favorite bands was being interviewed on the radio.
(The interview was in English).
I was so excited to hear it, and when one of my friends asked me about what they were saying, all I could think of was:
“Mmmm… yeah, I wonder what they’re saying?”
At that time, my level was good to read English, but I couldn’t understand native speakers.
So, since I didn’t have a transcription to support me as I was listening to the interview, I didn’t get anything out of it.
Textbook dialogues won’t help you made progress in Spanish
Avoid the traditional dialogues that you find in textbooks.
They’re not helpful.
These kinds of conversations have a very unnatural vocabulary.
You know what dialogues I’m talking about, right?
You’ll find them written in one of the pages of your textbook, and the audio comes in the cd-room that comes along with it.
They won’t help you because these kinds of dialogues go at an unnatural conversation speed, they’re and perfectly pronounced.
What’s even worse, they use the vocabulary taught in the textbook, which is nothing like real-life Spanish.
Usually it’s somehting like this:
- Juan: Buenos días, señor:
- Miguel: Buenos días.
- Juan: ¿Cuál es tu nombre?
- Miguel: Mi nombre es Miguel
Nobody talks like that!
And yes those dialogues may be helpful when you’re just learning to identify your first words in Spanish.
But if you want to learn to understand native speakers, then you’ll need more than that.
Ideally, a good dialogue in Spanish must have:
- A conversational rhythm
- Vocabulary people use in real life
- Text so you can read everything you hear
now, if you’re looking for dialogues in Spanish to visit in order to read online here is a list good resources I found on the internet.
I hope they’re helpful:
#1 YouTube Interviews
Interviews are dialogues between a reporter and someone else.
Yeah, I was listening to an interview in that story I told you before.
And yes, I failed to understand it, but over time I learned that there are some tools to help us succeed when we hear interviews in foreign languages.
A good idea is to use Youtube to hear interviews in Spanish.
It’s free and you can activate the autogenerated subtitles to improve your understanding of the conversation.
Yes, they won’t always be 100% accurate, but they’ll be great to get the gist of what you hear.
You’ll understand way more with those subtitles than what I understood from that radio interview.
On my YouTube channel, I have a full playlist of Spanish interviews that may be helpful for you.
I was shocked when I heard People like Ben Affleck or Gwyneth Paltrow speaking Spanish.
Their accents are so good, that I think they almost pass for native speakers.
Click here to check out the playlist on YouTube, it’s all free!
#2 Podcasts
If you are at an advanced level of Spanish then you need to start listening to podcasts.
During these internet shows you hear people talking spontaneously, naturally, and using everyday vocabulary and idioms.
Although most podcasts are all about only one person talking, you might find some shows in which you hear people having conversations.
Some podcasts have the transcription of everything that is being said, two of those conversations like podcasts are:
- The Spanish Obsessed Podcast.
- Easy Spanish Podcast (Transcription is available with a Patreon membership)
Another option is going for podcasts made from native speakers and for n native speakers.
However, these shows usually don’t have the transcription, but they’re full of real-life vocabulary.
I’m sure that if you’re serious about your Spanish learning, you’ll get to a point in which you’ll hear only shows that are for native speakers.
To find shows like that, just go to Spotify, or iTunes, and browse through the podcasts available on those platforms.
#3 SpanishBoom
This is a free website full of resources to learn Spanish for free.
What came to my attention was that it has an exclusive section for dialogues in Spanish.
These conversations come in audio format, and they all have their respective transcription.
The dialogues aren’t too complicated, and they’re organized into different categories according to the level of the student who wants to use them.
The site also has a section with cartoons in Spanish in which you’ll be able to see some Peppa Pig episodes in this language.
Of course, when you watch cartoons, what you’re hearing is, basically, dialogues between the characters of the show.
And the good thing about it is that they’re for kids, and that makes cartoons easier to understand.
Perfect to learn Spanish!
RELATED: What Is The Best Cartoon To Learn Spanish With?
#4 123TeachMe
123teachme offers a lot of different dialogues in Spanish for free.
Just like SpanishBoom, this site has his dialogues organized by the level of the learner.
One thing that I liked is that they included more categories.
That means that you’ll find dialogues depending on the topics of the conversations and even the tenses of what you’ll hear.
However, something I didn’t like about this resource is that the dialogues don’t sound natural.
Not because of the vocabulary they use, but because it sounds like their really bad actors.
Just my opinion though. 😅
#5 StudySpanishLanguage
On this site, you’ll find a collection of good dialogues in Spanish for beginners for free.
To be honest, the dialogues don’t sound very natural, but I checked the vocabulary they use, and it uses words people use in real life.
(Bad actors again. Don’t blame me, I’ve been educated by Hollywood on actor quality 😅)
Another plus I found on this site is that it offers audio + transcription for all the conversations.
I’m sure that as an independent learner, they will be really useful because:
- You won’t have to pay anything.
- There’s no rush to go to the next dialog.
- It’s all at your own pace.
Another good thing is that they have some side notes after the conversation to clarify the meaning of some words or expressions from the dialogues.
#6 101 Conversations in Spanish Collections
This collection of books is available in different languages.
There are 3 versions of these books for Spanish:
These books tell stories through fun conversations, which means that you’ll understand the story as you read the dialogues.
One of the features I like about this collection is that there’s an extra effort to get to know the characters:
A short overview and description of who will talk.
In other words, you’ll get to know the characters before they start the conversation.
There’s also a useful section of vocabulary that will help you clarify anything you don’t understand from the conversation.
Even better, each version of this book has its audio reading available on audible, which is a huge advantage for you to listen and read at the same time.
#7 Conversations by Olly Richards
Conversations by Olly Richards is a powerful course that aims to improve your listening skills to understand native speakers.
And how does it do it?
We can say that the course is a whole story.
However, the story is told in dialogues, which means that just like the collection of books I mentioned previously, you won’t hear a narrator.
Instead of that, you’ll hear dialogues to understand what’s going on in this story.
Click here to check out Conversations.
A while ago I made the following video in which I show exactly how it works and what the dialogues are like:
In my opinion, this course is worth the time and money, your skills to understand native speakers will increase tremendously after you go through it.
#8 LingQ
This is my favorite language learning app, and one of the reasons for that is that it offers such a big catalog when it comes to learning material.
Among other things, you’ll find:
- Stories
- Articles
- Podcasts
- Conversations
- And dialogues
Lots of dialogues!
All of that has audio + text + an incredible system to set goals and measure your progress.
Not to mention all the tools LingQ offers to find out the meaning of unknown words and expressions.
No doubt, if you’re looking for dialogues in Spanish, you’ll find them on LingQ.
Click here to check out LingQ.
Conclusion
If you want to use dialogues in Spanish to improve your listening skills to understand native speaker, then make sure the dialogues you use Have:
- A conversational rhythm
- Vocabulary people use in real life
- A transcription so you can read everything you hear
All of the resources I listed above meet those requirements and I want to encourage you to use any of those.
For me, the top 3 from this list looks like this:
- The 101 conversations in Spanish collection series books
- Conversations by Olly Richards course.
- YouTube Interviews.
Over to you:
Do you know any other resources where you can find dialogues in Spanish online?
What are your favorite resources?
Let me know in the comments below, perhaps I might include them in this list.
