Real Spanish grew out of a very personal experience. I had dedicated my professional career to language teaching, first as a teacher of English as a second or foreign language in several countries, then as a professor in the Faculty of Education of the University of Toronto. I thought I knew everything there was to know about language learning, I also had been studying Spanish for years, so how hard could it be?

 But when I came to live in Barcelona, I realised I still had a long way to go— especially with spoken language. How fast people spoke! Words I knew that made no sense to me in so many contexts! And when I dared to take a turn in a conversation, I was so anxious about the grammar and so on, that I either missed my turn or felt embarrassed about my pronunciation.

Then one day, a TVE series (Spain's national broadcaster) changed everything: suddenly the language came alive in a way no Spanish class had ever achieved. Since then, I have dedicated my work to creating resources that do the same for other learners - authentic, effective, and above all, in real Spanish.

I'm not a native speaker, of course, so I work with a native teacher, Gema, and a team of freelancers from various Spanish-speaking countries. You can meet them below. You can also watch an interview with me and get answers to your questions about our courses and resources.