Archive for May, 2009

Spanish language lessons to get you started

Here are some Spanish language lessons to get your started quickly with learning Spanish. The syntax or grammar defines how to write sentences and semantics defines the meaning of those sentences. So, let’s look into this a little deeper.

Let’s start off the lesson by writing our first sentence in Spanish:

Luis kicks the ball (Luis patea la pelota).

This is a really simple sentence, if you are a native English speaker it should look familiar to you, it has three parts: Subject + Verb + Object.

  • The Subject is the person or thing doing an action (Luis)
  • The Verb is an action (patea, to kick)
  • The Object is the person or thing involved in the action (la pelota, a ball)

For our Spanish language lessons like this one, we will just use the present tense. You usually specify a subject using pronouns, which usually works quite differently from English ones.

They include:

yo (I)
tu (You)
él/ella (He/She)
nosotros (We)
vosotros (You)
ellos/ellas (They)

You can ommit personal pronouns due to context.

Let’s see another example:

He kicks the ball (Él patea la pelota).

A verb describe some action. Unfortunately, with this language, verbs conjugations are quite complex at first.

Why?

Because  they conjugate according to the person (i.e. change depending on who is being talked about), even though this is familiar for native English speakers, because they do this everytime they use the third person singular. In the Spanish language, this occurs for every single person.

An example will illustrate this:

I kick the ball = Yo pateo la pelota

He kicks the ball = Ella patea la pelota

They kick the ball = Ellos patean la pelota

As you can see, the verb patear (to kick) changes depending on who is being talked about. A noun is a word used to refer to a person, place, thing or quality. In Spanish, they have two genders: masculine and feminine. Usually the masculine is marked by the ending “o” in singular, and the feminine by “a”.

We have many more Spanish language lessons available for you to learn from, such as our best way to learn Spanish article.  Or you can read more about how to learn the Spanish language online.  Please feel free to browse our related articles at the right to see all the lessons available for learning the Spanish language.

Your #1 goal should be to speak fluent Spanish

Have you ever wondered why you should speak fluent Spanish? Well, here are a few good reasons…

It will enhance your traveling experience for any kind of situation; From asking for directions to making connections with the locals. You will be able to immerse yourself in foreign arts and culture even at your hometown feature where a  wealth of cultural diversity and discovery is waiting for you.

Improving your skills will get you an opportunity to speak with over 320 million people around the globe who speak Spanish and if you like to help others learning to speak fluent Spanish will put you in a position where you can help both Spanish speakers who don’t speak English and English speakers who don’t speak Spanish.   As you can see, learning how to speak Spanish fluently has its many advantages.

And as you should know, many Spanish speaking countries are really poor there are a lot of people in serious need. Learning to speak fluent Spanish will prepare you going there and making a difference in the world!

When you learn a new language, like Spanish, you exercise your brain and boost your discipline and diligence. You can also expand your vision about the world, researching about events from more than one media source for the news.  If you can learn Spanish quick, you may be able to do all of this within the next couple months!

Researchers have indicated that being fluent and using two languages reduces your chances of developing Alzheimer’s Disease. Knowing how to be fluent in more than one language, like Spanish and English also helps enhance mental abilities in both children and older adults. Studying foreign languages can improve your memory and slow your brain age-related decline.

Being able to speak fluent Spanish will also help you in this globalized world. If you are able to speak the Spanish language fluently, you can be the difference between seizing an opportunity and yielding it to someone else. Sell your product, your service or even yourself to Spanish speakers worldwide.