Spanish course notes (compiled by Mike Cowlishaw »)
Since 2016 I have been attending daytime Spanish courses run by
the
Coventry City Council Adult Education Service – CovLearn », taught by the outstanding Pilar Agudo-Tarancón.
This website collects my personal notes made while working through
lesson annotations, homework, text books, etc. Some issues are
over-simplified (especially early notes), and also the style of presentation
has changed over the years (I’m working on improving that, but in
general a bold font is used for Spanish words).
Please note the books I have used. In general, I only
use examples that occur in multiple sources, and I usually modify
those examples (typically to alternatives that might be of more interest
to adult, rather than teenage, students of Spanish).
Comments and feedback (especially corrections!) are welcome; some
of my earlier notes are are quite naïve. My contact details are here ».
In progress
Web links
General rules
alphabet and special characters – names and saying (spelling),
etc.
pronunciation, stress and accents
nouns, pronouns, and pronouns table
definite articles – the (el, la, los, las)
prepositions
adjectives
adverbs
numbers – ages, money
personal a
shortened forms
Thematic
hello – what’s your name, etc.
people – relatives, etc.
work – what do you do?
drinks, food – ordering, verbs, etc.
weather – words and verbs
what – questioning, that, than, etc.
where – places, directions, etc.
when – time, dates, etc.
this and that – (and yonder) este, éste, ese,
esa, aquel; also here and there, etc.
para y por – for, etc.
play – playing words
Verb rules
-ar verbs – hablar, desear, etc.
-er verbs – comer, entender, leer, etc.
-ir verbs – vivir, escribir, etc.
reflexive verbs
verbs like gustar
verb forms – conjugations and summary of how they are used
compound verb forms – forms and summary
present tenses
past tenses
future tenses
present subjunctive
imperfect subjunctive
conditional
imperative
passive voice – using se or ser + past participle
progressive/continuous – estar + gerundio
Note: perfect tenses are haber + past
participle
Regular verbs
hablar – to speak (prototypical -ar)
comer – to eat (prototypical -er)
vivir – to live (prototypical -ir)
Irregular/noteworthy verbs
(In approximate frequency order; † denotes a regular verb.)
Working list of ‘Multi-meaning verbs’ (also listed below)
ser and estar – to be (soy,
somos; estoy, estamos)
haber – to have, to be, have to (he,
has, ha ...)
tener – to hold, to have (tengo, tiene,
tenemos)
hacer – to do, to make (hago, haces)
poder – to be able to (puedo,
podemos)
decir – to say, to tell (digo, dices;
dije)
ir – to go (voy, vamos)
ver – to see (veo, ves; vi, viste)
dar – to give (doy, damas)
saber – to know, to find out, to taste
(sé, sabes, sabe .. supe)
querer – to want (quiero, queremos)
llegar – to arrive, to reach †
pasar – to pass, to pass by, to go
†
deber – to owe, must †
poner – to put, to place (pongo...)
parecer – to seem, to think (parezco,
pareces .. parezca, parezcas)
quedar – to stay, to fit †
creer – to believe, to suppose †
hablar – to speak †
llevar – to take, carry, wear, have,
etc. †
dejar – to leave, to allow †
seguir – to follow (sigo, seguimos)
– silent u
encontrar – to meet, to find (encuentro,
encuentras .. encuentre)
llamar – to call, name †
venir – to come (vengo, vienes)
gustar – to be pleasing to †, etc.
(uses indirect object pronouns) – and verbs like gustar
oír – to hear (oigo, oyes; oí, oíste)
soler – to tend to, to be in the
habit of (suelo, sueles ..suela)
Vocabulary
vocabulary – sundry words and phrases that I’ve found interesting
and maybe worth reviewing
Reviewed