Learning Spanish: How to Understand and Speak a New Language

Begin this final lesson with useful vocabulary regarding professions, technology, and the Internet. Learn about key verbs that are commonly used with prepositions, and review the preterite tense.

Round out your knowledge of the preterite by working with the full range of Spanish verbs that are irregular in this tense. Grasp why, in studying the present and preterite tenses, you have now learned the hardest verb conjugations in the Spanish language.

Continue your exploration of this vital tense in Spanish, and learn to express past actions with regular -er and -ir verbs, stem-changing verbs, and irregular verbs. Observe how some Spanish verbs actually change meaning when used in the preterite.

Begin to work with the preterite tense, which expresses actions completed in the past. Explore how to use this tense in Spanish, how to conjugate regular -ar verbs, and how to make preterite conjugations easy to remember.

Delve into vocabulary relating to sports and outdoor activities, and investigate the importance of el fºtbol,, or soccer, in Spanish-speaking countries. Learn how to make comparisons involving actions, numbers, and things that are equal, and how to express superlatives.

Study and practice informal commands, both affirmative and negative, including their important irregular forms. Learn vocabulary related to the human body, and practice commands referring to the body.

Continue to enlarge your vocabulary with words relating to places, such as public venues and businesses. Then learn how to say formal commands, also known as imperatives, as well as negative commands, and practice using them in different contexts.

This lesson introduces two common constructions that allow you to ask how long someone has done something, and how long something has been going on. Following this, add a range of vocabulary related to leisure activities, household chores, and romantic relationships.

Here, add important vocabulary relating to motion and travel, and learn some common reflexive verbs that describe mental and emotional states. Then study two useful constructions for speaking about the past: acabar de, which describes something that just happened, and hace€¦que, which expresses how long something has been going on.

Reflexive verbs are those for which the subject and the object of the action are the same (as in, €œI wash myself€ in English). Study how these verbs function in Spanish, and learn commonly used examples.

Enlarge your vocabulary with words relating to rooms and furnishings in a house, and learn how to say ordinal numbers in Spanish. Then study how to use indirect and direct object pronouns together (as in, €œI give it to you€ in English), and explore some important expressions using the verb pensar (to think).

Continue working with vocabulary related to clothing, and practice describing clothing. Then study Spanish indirect object pronouns - pronouns that replace indirect objects - and learn verbs that commonly use them.

Learn and practice a range of new vocabulary related to colors, followed by words that describe clothing. Take a detailed look at Spanish affirmative and negative adjectives (as in €œsome€ and €œnone€ in English), which can also be used as pronouns.

Now add the Spanish demonstrative adjectives (���this�۝ and ���that�۝ in English) and the related demonstrative pronouns, and study additional vocabulary related to eating dinner. Look at ways to create both affirmative and negative statements in Spanish, and learn about regional differences in the language as it�۪s spoken across the world.

Begin with additional vocabulary concerning food and drink, focusing on breakfast and lunch. Then study direct object pronouns (such as €œthem€ in English), which replace direct object nouns to avoid redundancy, and learn their uses and placement in Spanish.

The present progressive is a useful grammatical construction in Spanish that describes something that is in progress right now, happening in the present. Learn how to form and use the present progressive, and how its use in Spanish differs from the way it�۪s used in English.

Delve into the fascinating history of U.S. place names that are derived from Spanish, including the names of five states. Continue your work with key irregular verbs, and study important guidelines for conjugating them. Then, listen to excerpts from a Spanish newscast, and explore the value of listening to the news in Spanish.

Here, work with Spanish verbs that are irregular-not in their tense endings, but in the verb stems used to conjugate them. Study how to conjugate verbs of this type as you learn a range of new verbs.

Spanish has two verbs, saber and conocer, which carry the meanings of the English verb €œto know.€ Investigate their conjugations, their differences in meaning, and their uses.

Study the verb hacer (to make or to do), and learn some of the many familiar expressions that use it. Continue with the similar verbs poner, salir, and traer, and take a deeper look at Spanish interrogatives.

This lesson begins with another important irregular verb: tener (to have). Grasp how to conjugate tener, and learn expressions using it regarding physical conditions, emotional conditions, and age.

First, practice telling the time of day in Spanish, expressing the hour and minutes, and learn important vocabulary relating to time. Continue with the days of the week and vocabulary regarding days and dates.

Begin with an important irregular verb: ir, meaning €œto go€. Conjugate ir in the present tense, and learn about its key uses in Spanish.

Conjugate two new categories of Spanish verbs - those that end in -er and -ir. For both, learn and practice the appropriate endings for the present tense.

Investigate the verb estar, the second Spanish verb for €œto be€. Learn about the uses of estar, as contrasted with ser.

Acquire the Spanish indefinite articles (€œa€, €œan€, and €œsome€ in English), and observe how indefinite articles are used in Spanish. Learn to count to 100, and practice simple math problems.

Here, learn about an important category of Spanish verbs-those whose infinitives end in -ar. Conjugate regular -ar verbs in the present tense by identifying the verb�۪s stem and adding the appropriate endings.

Investigate the five singular subject pronouns and the seven plural subject pronouns in Spanish, and how they are used in Spanish-speaking cultures. Then conjugate the verb ser (to be) in the present tense, create simple sentences, and explore how Spanish adjectives agree with the nouns they modify in number and gender.

Learn the gender of Spanish nouns by practicing each new noun with its masculine or feminine definite article. Grasp how the suffixes of nouns can help identify their gender.

Begin by looking at both the €œwhats€ of Spanish (elements such as grammar and vocabulary), and the €œhows€-how to study, practice, and learn the language most effectively. Start with identifying cognates (Spanish words that are similar to their English equivalents), hearing the five Spanish vowel sounds, and practicing basic greetings, responses, and goodbyes.