Las Telenovelas~Spanish Soaps

I'm currently watching 4 telenovelas on the Latino channels:

2 on Univision called 'Apuesta por un amor' and 'La Madrasta'.

2 on Telemundo called 'Mujer en el espejo' and 'Los Plateados'.

My favorite is Los Plateados. It's a time period soap from the long dresses and western type era. The main female in the plot was forced to marry a man she didn't love, who paid off her families debts and saved them from ruin. There is a group of bandits called Los Plateados that work by 'the Robin Hood' theory. They steal from the rich and give back to the beaten down village people that the rich abuse and steal from. The heroin that was forced to marry is named Camilla, and has fallen in love with the head of the Plateados. She tried to run off with him and her husband caught her and now has her locked up until she asks for forgiveness (ain't gonna happen).

Hola

I often hear from spanish speaking friends often that the soap operas are not good for beginners. I was wondering if spanish teachers have the same opinion?

adios

Soap Operas are GREAT for beginners, intermediate and advanced second language learners..they are the King's English of the Spanish language... unless there is a character that is being portrayed as 'uneducated' and then that role will use a 'street' language.... the only problem is the 'corny' dullness of some of them, but if you try to get into following a character or plot it will really pay off bigtime in advancing both comprehension and spoken fluency. Imagine the sense of accomplishment and confidence you would build if you could follow a complicated plot like Sandrita did in her post above...meanwhile, you have to start somewhere.
In my opinion the two foremost aids in second language aquisition are; conversation in the second language and watching TV programs is a close second....(recording conversation, and reviewing it, is also dynamite for rapid progress..)

Hola

I often hear from spanish speaking friends often that the soap operas are not good for beginners. I was wondering if spanish teachers have the same opinion?

adios

Matt - so many people have the idea that they are wasting their time because they don't understand the words yet. But the truth is that people who hold off listening until they think they will understand it, often quit, because after all they 'learned' they didn't understand anything. They were advanced in learning and babies at recognition. You don't want to get to the end of learning just to find out you are a baby in the recognition stage. It's vital to start listening to Spanish as soon as possible. You will develope and 'ear' for what it sounds like and won't come to the end of several years of study with the wrong pronunciation. Please turn on the captioning and read the words as they speak. Your brain will connect the sounds it hears with the words it sees and learn to sort the sounds into words, even the ones you don't know yet. Captions are on CC1, and are usually on the Telemundo and Univision soaps, sometimes Telefutura. If your tv has a remote control, look in the menu section and see if there is a command to turn on the captions, and choose CC1.

Remember that when a baby is watching tv it doesn't start crying because it doesn't understand the words. Be the baby :)
Also, Latino soaps are extremely dramatic, that means that it's even easier to be able to understand what is happening.

G'day,

You'll have to tell me how La Madrasta ended. I left mexico last week, and they were in the final weeks....so I was really sad not to see the end. I was glued to the TV every night at 9pm. Gotta love the Mexican Soaps!