Program Reviews

I had a fabulous time staying with Pilar. When you start to use in a real context, in a Spanish environment, what you have learnt in the classroom or online, it brings it to life and it is such fun.
We had lessons on the beautiful terrace of Pilar's house at the foot of the hills in the mornings. Then off to one of many wonderful places to put our learning into practice.
Valencia is a beautiful city with so much history but also some spectacular modern locations.
The food was absolutely fantastic, everyone should try Horchata and local fish Paella.
The old market is a great place to buy local delicacies and souvenirs.
Pilar's house is very spacious, comfortable and close to Segunto, an ancient town with a lot of Roman history.

I can't express how fantastic my experience with Spanish Express was. I spent about a week each with two separate teachers: Mónica in Barcelona and Pilar in Valencia. I noticed a significant improvement in my Spanish, and I now have greater faith in my language skills. They gave me delicious local cuisine and were accommodating, courteous, and patient.

My girlfriend is from Galicia so next time I visit my Spanish family (future in-laws, etc.), I can absolutely use this experience to my advantage. When I next see them in summer, I really want to impress them with my Spanish. Looking forward to seeing their faces!

I'm very glad I found this programme since I could not have produced such an experience on my own with a conventional language school. The exposure to culture, history, and language I gained was beyond my expectations.

My stay with Mónica was wonderful. The food was superb. Mónica's Dad, who lives upstairs with her Mum, is an amazing chef. The accommodation is lovely – you have your own room and bathroom. Dosrius has many popular attractions, including the picturesque town itself, the Parc del Montnegre i el Corredor, the Enchanted forest and the port and beach within a 20-minute drive, making it well worth a visit.
Mónica is a fantastic teacher, and I believe that throughout the week I spent with her, my Spanish really improved. Until I'm prepared to take the remote exam with Mónica, I'll continue taking classes with her online. The fact that Spanish Express is an accredited SIELE centre makes everything stress-free and l absolutely love the opportunity to be able to take the SIELE exam remotely.

I stayed with my 2 daughters in Gilet, in a lovely small town near the city Valencia.

Pilar Martinez, our teacher and host in the 10 days we stayed in Spain gave as an excellent experience to learn Spanish, to have the opportunity to practice the language and get to know the way of Spanish life.

Besides the lessons, Pilar took us to different excursions to get to know the city of Valencia, the coast, eat local food and we even went to the famous Tomatina, which is a yearly festival in the town of Buñol where we had a blast.

I had a fantastic time in Dosrius, in the province of Barcelona, with Mónica, her parents and her 2 Golden Retrievers: Rumba and Samba. Mónica is warm, fun, kind, and generous, and I had a great time with her! She went out of her way to ensure that I was taken care of and had a good time there.

She also worked hard to make sure my lessons were relevant to my needs. I am preparing for the SIELE exam this month.. I am going to take the remote exam with Spanish Express as they are an accredited centre. Mónica is a great teacher-examiner. I feelI am more than ready to take up the SIELE exam now.

Mónica’s house is in the Parc del Montnegre i el Corredor, the First Urban Quiet Park in Spain. I consider myself extremely fortunate to have had this opportunity! It was the ideal opportunity to meet a lovely lady and her family, practise my Spanish, and see so many beautiful places around the area. Absolutely an amazing experience, highly recommended!

First of all, I would like to thank Pilar, our Spanish teacher, for this experience. The way she teaches is excellent. I already knew a bit of Spanish, but my boyfriend, who also came with me to Valencia, didn't know any. But surprisingly, he went back home being able to maintain really interesting conversations with some friends we met there.

We stayed for over two weeks in Valencia. Each morning we started with a lesson after a fantastic breakfast that Pilar made for us. Once we finished the classes, Pilar took us around Valencia. We visited many places, '' el Barrio del Carmen'', which is beautiful and has a lot of history. Pilar showed us each of its charms, and of course, she accompanied us to the most beautiful monuments in Valencia, such as the Micalet or the Torres de Serrano and Quart.

We also saw the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias, where we could see some exhibitions. The visit to the Albufera was amazing, we saw the sunset, and it was one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen.

In short, I recommend this experience. Pilar is an incredible teacher; we learned a lot with her, and from her, she introduced us to many people. In fact, to this day, I still maintain a relationship with some of them, and I practice my Spanish, which is super important to me.

Certainly, an unforgettable experience, and we will repeat it soon.

I was looking for a different kind of solo trip to explore a new culture and stumbled across immersion courses with Spanish Express. I had never had a Spanish lesson in my life, but I’m genuinely shocked at how much I learned in just 7 days. The SHIP experience taught me so much about the culture of Cataluña, I feel really connected to the place and can’t wait to come back. Mónica is a fantastic teacher with a beautiful home and I felt really welcome. I cannot recommend this enough if you’re looking for a different kind of escape.

I had a fantastic experience during my course last year in Valencia with Pilar Martinez.
I had forgotten alot of the Spanish I had learned previously as I hadn’t been practicing enough. I thought what better way than to have an immersive course? Right from the beginning, I found myself immersed into the culture and enjoyed the trip. Pilar took me around Valencia, which was beautiful and I had the opportunity to practice my Spanish with the locals.

I left with a newfound confidence with my language capabilities and look forward to returning on my own to continue to develop my fluency.

I had been studying for the DELE C1 exam with regular virtual lessons with Mónica, and decided to bite the bullet and take advantage of the SHIP course. I have absolutely 0 regrets, an immersion course was exactly what I needed to understand, speak and live like a native Spaniard. I was a bit nervous at first as I’ve never done anything like this, but Moni was so accommodating. We did a range of activities, from city visits, museums, exploring nature reserves and not to mention all of the amazing food. The classes were intense, but not overwhelming as Moni tailored the course to my needs (mainly the subjunctive!!). I can notice a huge improvement in my Spanish and feel very confident that I can pass the DELE exam which I need for work. I am so thankful for Mónica’s support. Thank you SpanishExpress!

Portuguese and Spanish look very similar so we can generally read the other language without too much struggle. But when it comes to the spoken forms things get a bit more complicated. There’s an almost 90% lexical similarity between the two, which means that 90% of Spanish words have a cognate (equivalent) in Portuguese.

Being a Portuguese speaker and already having an advanced level in Spanish has been a great help to improve my Spanish for my next trip in Barcelona (It's my favourite city in Spain). The opportunity to be in the teacher’s house for 2 weeks has been amazing. I made more progress in 2 weeks than in a whole academic year at my language school back home. Also to mix with Mónica’s friends and family, learn about gastronomy and culture has broadened my horizons in general.

We had a varied social programme with plenty of excursions and things to do. I love nature and animals so my favourite excursions were all the visits we did around the Parc del Montnegre i el Corredor, the first 'park of silence' in Spain; the Donkey Reserve: Rukimon, a park where all the donkey breeds of the Peninsula live together. I really enjoyed petting and feeding them. They love cuddles and carrots!

But the contact with nature was not only limited to the Montnegre i Corredor park and our furry friends; we also visited Can Gel, a cow farm that allows you to interact with the animals and learn many relevant facts about their care. I even got the amazing opportunity to bottle feed a baby cow.

All in all it was an amazing experience that I would recommend to any travel lover wanting to experience Spain at first hand!