Trato Hecho!: Spanish For Real Life

I received this text book very quickly and it was in excellent shape! I would not hesitate to do business with this seller again.

I used this book this spring in an online continuing education course. I feel that this book is good for self-motivated students that have some prior Spanish. It could also serve as a intensive refresher course. In my opinion, the book is really enjoyable to work with. The pages are loaded with colorful drawings and photos. The book has grammar explanations that are simple and easy to follow. I also like how the book has pages with plenty of white space to jot down personal notes. This book has a total of twelve chapters with five themes developed in each chapter. At the end of each chapter there are about eight pages of additional information on various topics concerning cultural, travel, history, politics, and other matters of general interest. When I used this book, I set aside about one to two hours a day for study. I tried to complete one thematic unit each day. I finished studying the book in twelve weeks. This book has a companion website. The companion website provides audio for all the dialogues and vocabulary words in the book. In addition, the companion web site supports the book with vocabulary and grammar exercises, electronic flashcards, and a soccer game. The back cover of the book gives a list of additional student resources that can be purchased separately such as an activities manual, answer key, audio CDs, and other online resources. Most people will not feel a need for these additional resources; however, I recommend purchasing the Student Video CD-ROM. The video CD features about 25 Spanish speakers from all parts of the world. There is really nothing that I can say bad about this book. I highly recommend it!

I am using this book in an adult Spanish class, and I can not believe how quickly I have picked up conversational Spanish. I walked into the class knowing only the words enchilada and taco. Last week I had a conversation in Spanish with some of my neighbors!! I was thrilled(!) I have been a teacher for four decades, and have seen many textbooks. The book does a really good job of presenting material in an organized fashion. The chapters build upon the material presented in previous lessons, and there is a great deal of conversational practice built into it. Related vocabulary is presented in units (classroom vocabulary, home vocabulary, shopping vocabulary) following along with the lives of the persons introduced at the start of the book. It really helps to learn and speak the vocabulary in context like this.I recommend getting the audio CD along with it. There is also a workbook with more exercises, although I have not used that.I have an audio CD of the vocabulary words. I practice saying the vocabulary words at least an hour a week, while I am cleaning the house. I also spend about 1 to 2 hours a week studying the material. During this time I first do the exercises in the book, and then I make new questions and answers using the words and sentences, and practice saying those. I attend two one-hour classes a week. The teacher presents the material in the book, and we spend at least half of the time practicing talking using the material in the chapter. In summary, this is a great book if you are willing to put in the time to learn the material. You really must master one chapter before moving onto the next, and you must go beyond just doing the exercises. Creating and practicing your own sentences really helps to develop your conversational skills.

I'm bilingual, and teaching children. This book is GOOD!

Trato hecho is a revolutionary book that combines vocabulary and grammar in a wonderful, meaningful way. The introduction of the vocabulary in the first two parts of every episode gives the students the opportunity of getting into the subject and theme. Once this is done, the third part of that episode introduces the grammar in the same context that has been settled already. A great way to introduce grammar instead of just explaining a point and do meaningless and mechanical exercises on it.This is a perfect book for long classes (one hour and a half or so, per episode). The workbook supplies extra material and is very well designed. There is no problem like with other books in which you have to select what exercises are good and which ones you can just throw to the garbage.