3 months

Learn Spanish basics in 3 months

20 minutes a day, plus one 30-minute conversation a week

Twelve weeks buys you something the eight-week version cannot: the past tense, roughly 700 words, and enough conversation hours that speaking stops feeling like a performance. This is solid A1 and the edge of A2 — you can tell someone what you did yesterday, badly but clearly.

The failure mode here is not speed, it is the week-six slump, when the novelty is gone and the progress becomes invisible. So this plan schedules a lighter week before you need it, keeps the daily load at twenty minutes, and books a real conversation every single week from week three onward. Talking to people is the part that carries you through the boring middle.

The protocol

  1. Weeks 1–2

    Pronunciation and the first 200 words

    • Five vowel sounds, the rolled r, and the fact that Spanish is read exactly as written. Ten minutes a day out loud.
    • 10 new words a day from a frequency list, six days a week. Nouns, adjectives, and connectors — no verbs yet.
    • Do spaced-repetition reviews first, new cards second. If reviews take the whole 20 minutes, that is a complete session.
  2. Weeks 3–4

    Verbs and your first conversation

    • Present tense of ser, estar, tener, ir, querer, poder, hacer, hablar, comer, vivir, necesitar, gustar. Three persons only.
    • Book a 30-minute tutor session in week 3 and repeat it weekly from now on. Week 3 is early on purpose — the discomfort is the training.
    • Cumulative target: 320 words.
  3. Weeks 5–6

    Questions, numbers, and daily life

    • Numbers to 1,000, telling the time, prices, and days of the week.
    • All seven question words, plus 20 phrases you would use in a shop, a station, and a doctor's surgery.
    • Week 6 is when it stops feeling new. Expect that, and just do the reviews.
  4. Week 7

    Consolidation week

    • No new vocabulary at all. Reviews only, plus 15 minutes of listening a day.
    • Re-record yourself answering three questions you answered in week 4 and compare. This is the only progress measurement that ever convinces anyone.
    • Keep the weekly conversation. It is the one thing that does not pause.
  5. Weeks 8–9

    The past tense

    • Pretérito of regular -ar, -er, and -ir verbs, plus the irregulars you cannot avoid: fui, tuve, hice, estuve.
    • Every day, write three sentences about what you did yesterday. Three. Not a diary.
    • Cumulative target: 550 words.
  6. Weeks 10–11

    Listening and longer turns

    • Twenty minutes a day of learner podcasts, then one episode a week of a native show with Spanish subtitles.
    • In your tutor sessions, aim to talk for 60 seconds without stopping. Fluency at A1 means not freezing, not being correct.
    • Learn the connectors that buy you thinking time: bueno, entonces, o sea, es que.
  7. Week 12

    Prove the level and pick what is next

    • Hold a 20-minute conversation covering your week, your job, and something you did last month.
    • Final target: around 700 words, present and past tense, and you can be understood by someone who is not paid to understand you.
    • Decide now whether you are going to A2 or maintaining. Maintenance is 10 minutes of reviews a day and one conversation a week.

How you'll know it's working

  • You dream up sentences in Spanish while doing something else entirely.
  • Your tutor stops slowing down for you without being asked.
  • You can talk about yesterday, which is the moment Spanish stops being phrases and starts being language.

When you miss a day

The weekly conversation is the only non-negotiable; everything else bends. A missed week means reviews only until the backlog clears, then you carry on from where you stopped rather than where the calendar says you should be.

How Mosey helps

You don't have to hold the plan in your head.

Reading a protocol is the easy part. Mosey turns this one into scheduled days, adjusts it when your week falls apart, and keeps the streak alive while it does.

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Life happened on Wednesday. I trimmed Thursday down — the plan still lands on time.

Questions

Why is this slower than the eight-week plan?

It is not just slower, it is bigger. Twelve weeks adds the past tense, 300 more words, and roughly ten hours of speaking. Eight weeks gets you to survival; twelve gets you to conversation.

Can I skip the tutor and use a language exchange?

Yes, if it is scheduled and weekly. Exchanges drift into English and drift out of the calendar. A paid slot is mostly a commitment device.

How many words do I need to hold a real conversation?

Around 1,000 for comfort. At 700 you can hold a conversation about familiar things and get stuck on unfamiliar ones. That is normal and it is progress, not failure.

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