Level 25 Spanish

I don't think fluent but I can have casual conversations with friends, give directions, order food, buy things in stores, and pretty much do the daily rountine stuff. Happy learning!!

Not fluent

I would not say i am fluent and i using a lot of other sources too. So no, Dou wont make you fluent alone^

Duolingo alone will not make you fluent. You will want to use other resources if you are wanting to really speak Spanish!

I am not level 25 but will be one day in the near future. I also struggle with fluency. I at least get the opportunity to practice as I live in an area with a lot of Mexicans. I also take trips to TJ just to get away and practice. Today I saw a guy rolling a cart and confused a basic word as I stated esta pagando helado? He looked at me with intrigue as I walked away and I thought vendiendo you idiot! But I will continue taking chances and making mistakes and one day I will hopefully be able to hear and respond and not sound like a 4 year old child.

I finished the tree and made level 25 (but I notice now that the "level" thing seems to be gone). I'm definitely not fluent. I also dropped off for over a year from Duo. I enjoyed it, but at the time my major motivations for learning had disappeared. At the beginning of 2018, I started a quest for a new place to live. The process was frustrating and time was running out on my lease. I have a friend from Mexico (yup, one of those Trump is trying to get kicked out) who had broken contact with me for a few months because of a boyfriend she acquired. It turned out for the worse and she resumed her friendship with me. About that time, I complained about my home search and she told me her sister had a house to rent. It wasn't ready yet, but I was desperate. Somehow, we worked it out.

Now I have a land-lady who speaks NO English. Sure, a few phrases like "thank you" or "how are you?" but conversation was impossible. My friend is frustrated that her sister won't learn English. But then, my friend struggles; I'm the only person she speaks English with. This came as a shock to me, but if you speak Spanish, there are major chunks of the USA where you don't have to speak English at all.

Slightly funny aside: I took her and a couple bilingual little girls to lunch at a Thai restaurant. It was a place I liked for years, but they have let quality drop recently. I was disappointed in my meal and she with hers. A bus-boy came up to clear the table and he struck up a short conversation with my friend. He bad-mouthed his own restaurant and said there were much better places. I was amused. Nobody on staff nearby had a clue what was being said (staff being all Thai). I was happy that my Spanish was to a point that I could follow along. I didn't let on that I understood or I suspect the bus-boy wouldn't have talked the way he did.

One day my landlady's girls were at my house. One is 8 and bilingual. The other is 3 and Spanish only. If you want to improve a language and practice with less fear, talk to children. I asked the older girl her name. Then I tried the same with the little one and she turned shy. I asked the big sister if she spoke any English. Nope. "Como se llamas?" Now I got a reply. "Cuantos años tienes?" Then came the universal 3yo response: hold up 3 fingers silently.

I have a long way to go. I have a great vocabulary and book-learning grasp of grammar. But formulating a sentence live feels like doing calculus. But I'm back to having reasons to learn. Wish me luck.

Duolingo can't make you fluent. Finishing the tree only takes you to about A2 or lower B1.

Level 25 doesn't mean much. You can technically get level 25 from repeating Basics 1 3,000 times.

I'm like just about everyone else who answered. I'm not fluent. If I were, I'd write this en español.

I've improved but a lot of that was because I was out of practice for years.

To really become fluent I think I need to talk to others regularly and read and watch TV in Spanish more often.

Anecdote:

When I was in high school they had a program for students to spend a few weeks in Spain or South America. (They alternated destinations each year).

Of course not everybody could go, but everyone who did came back light years ahead of those of us who didn't.

I've only been to Mexico a handful of times and never for very long but even that was beneficial.

I recently tested at B2, but I wouldn't say I'm fluent. I can communicate fairly well in full sentences, and make myself understood. If I don't understand something, or don't know a specific word, I can usually work around it, and explain what I'm trying to say.
I also use Rocket Spanish and work with a couple of tutors on Skype.

There is no substitute for speaking and listening with native Spanish speakers.

Google something like

Spanish language exchange

For a local one near you and meet up :- you WILL improve dramatically.

www.paseoatraves.wordpress.com

My silly blog about my days wandering about in my bad Spanish

Buenos dias!! Alguien estaria interesado en intercambiar nuestros idiomas? Soy español nativo y tengo nivel B1 de ingles. Me gustaria poder contactar con alguien de habla inglesa. Si hay alguien interesado podemos mirar de como hacerlo. Gracias.

I'm not there yet, but I've learned quite a bit from conversing with native speakers

I learned spanish just from Duolingo, but I am not fluent.

No you can not learn solely from Duolingo. It is not 100% accurate (no where near) and it does not give you speaking practice with accurate feedback. It is still a very good tool to be used in conjunction with others.

I will have to admit that the duolingo stories are really helpful as well. I encourage listening to them to hear the language better