Spanish 101 Grammar points

Tip: Many Spanish phrases do not translate literally.

For example: "Me llamo"

Although we translate Me llamo Deborah as "My name is Deborah", it really means "I'm called Deborah" or "I call myself Deborah". To avoid the error of "*Me llamo es..." [*I'm called is ] and similar errors resulting from English constructions, try to focus on Spanish phrases rather than word for word translations.

An asterisk [*] by an example on these pages means the example is an ungrammatical phrase which you should avoid saying.

NOTE: Scroll to the bottom of each page of the Grammar explanations to locate exercises, games and practice!

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the alphabet, pronunciation, greetings, gender and adjective agreement, and more
grammar structures & constructs
includes practice exercises!

the different tenses and moods, specific basic verbs, verbs like Gustar, stem-changing and irregular verbs
includes practice exercises!

days of the week, months, seasons, dates, time and as well as supplemental terms describing clothing, body parts, family, travel and more
includes practice exercises!

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Tip: Words which look like English words are called cognates. Sometimes cognates are spelled exactly the same in both Spanish and English, such as golf . Other cognates may vary by a letter or two, such as oficina (office) and computadora (computer).

Words that look like English words but have different meanings are called false cognates. A good example is embarazada. It doesn't mean "embarrassed"; it means "to be pregnant"! As you can see it is usually better to check a dictionary than assume a word is a cognate.

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