Spanish 5

Watch this short video about why our online Language program is one of the best in the country!

Newly revised! This practical high-intermediate course (B1.1) designed for adult language learners will improve your ability to have sustained conversations about a wide range of topics. Learn the differences between the present subjunctive and indicative and improve your use of complex sentence structures.

You will learn to communicate with more ease and sophistication about everyday topics such as customs, the workplace, and expressing opinions. Learn to summarize the plots of movies or stories, situate events in the future and give advice or make requests with the subjunctive mood. Deepen your understanding of commands and impersonal forms. See the Outline for more details. All materials included.

Prerequisite: Spanish 4.

Find out if this is the right level for you with these placement tests: Spanish 4 self-placement test, Spanish 5 self-placement test.

Course format

You will practice speaking in 10 weekly online sessions of 75 minutes led by an experienced instructor with a maximum of 14 participants, using a mix of small and large group conversation activities.

The live online sessions begin one week after the scheduled course start date to allow time to work through the first unit of learning material in preparation for the live conversation practice.

Online course materials introduce new grammar and vocabulary and teach pronunciation, listening, and reading skills through videos, audio, and interactive exercises. Budget 4-5 hours a week to work through the online asynchronous content.

Course materials become available online on the scheduled course start date and remain accessible for one month after the course ends.

Want to know more about learning a language online? Read Dr. Julie Dahl's blog post about our online course format.

Sections anticipated for Spring 2026 (See Upcoming Dates for open sections and more detail): 

Tuesdays, Feb. 3–April 21, 5:30–6:45 p.m. CT (No virtual conversation on Mar. 3)

Wednesdays, Mar. 4–May 13, 5:30–6:45 p.m. CT

Please see the textbook link under fee and more information.

Course Outline

Below are the main themes for each unit. Each unit contains teaching videos, listening activities, extended readings, practical exercises, and cultural information related to the unit theme.

Unidad 1: Las señales

• Learn about different signage across Latin America
• Review informal commands, both positive and negative
• Use se impersonal to discuss rules
• Review the imperfect tense

Unidad 2: Las costumbres

• Learn about customs in Peru, Mexico and Argentina
• Review common saludos
• Incoporporate quantifiers into your speech
• Prepositions of place

Unidad 3: La educación

• Expand your vocabulary when discussion your educational experiences
• Use reflexive and non-reflexive verbs accurately
• Use the expressions darse cuenta de and tender a to talk about ah-ha moments and tendencies when learning
• Practice using prepositional and possessive pronouns with greater accuracy

Unidad 4: El mundo del trabajo

• Discuss your career, past and present
• Discover more work vocabulary to expand your conversational ability
• Familiarize yourself with different categories of frases verbales
• Review regular preterite tense verbs

Unidad 5: Repaso

• Review irregular preterite tense verbs
• Review when to use the preterite and the imperfect
• Prepositions of direction

Unidad 6: Las artes

• Expand your vocabulary of musical instruments and genres
• Prepositions of time
• Use connectors to indicate cause, effect, and opposition
• Explore different forms of art while growing your vocabulary

Unidad 7: Tu vida ahora y en el futuro

• Future tense — conjugation and uses
• Make predictions about the future
• Direct and indirect object pronouns together

Unidad 8: Expresar opiniones

• Review formal commands
• Forming the present subjunctive
• El subjuntivo con expresiones impersonales
• El subjuntivo con aunque

Unidad 9: Resumir una película o un cuento

• El subjuntivo con emociones
• El subjuntivo con dudar que y creer que
• Read a short story in Spanish or watch a movie and summarize it

Unidad 10: Repaso final

• Reflect on your learning journey... ¡en español!
• Comprehensive review of the major grammar topics in the course

By participating in this class you will earn:

Instructional Hours	48
University of Wisconsin Continuing Education Units	4.8

Explanation of Continuing Education Hours