Lesson 5 - El Articulo II (indefinite article)

The indefinite article in spanish is equivalent to "a,an, some" in english. it has 4 forms depending on whether the noun is masculine, femenine, singular or plural

un (masculine singular)
una (femine singular)
unos (masculine plural)
unas (femine plural)

a) "Un, una" are the singular form, and are used to express just one object:
un gato (one cat, a cat)
un libro (one book, a book)
un lapicero (one pen, a pen)

una camisa (one shirt, a shirt)
una mesa (one table, a table)
una silla (one chair, a chair)


b) "unos, unas" are the plural forms, the are equivalent to "some" in english, they give an idea about few objects.

unos gatos (some male cats)
unos libros (some books)
unos hombres (some men)

unas personas (some persons)
unas carpetas (some desks)
unas medias (some socks)

*remeber when you talk about a group of objects, and into the object there's at less one "male", at this case you should use the masculine plural form. For example:

if you have 10 cats, nine of them are female cats, and the other one is a male cat, you would say:
diez gatos/ los gatos/unos gatos.... always in masculine.





here's is a table with the resumen of articles in spanish:



















For remember the rules and using of plurals please go to the lesson of Plural rules:
http://mau-spanish.blogspot.com/2009/07/lesson-3-los-plurales.html

Lesson 4 - El Articulo (definite article)

In this lesson we wil learn the definite article, wich equivalent in english is "the":
The article in spanish could be masculine or femenine, and also singular and plural

---------- Singular ------ Plural
Masculine.. el ..... .. los
Femenine .. la .................. las


Singular: the singular form is el for masculine nouns and la for femenine nouns:
el perro (the dog)
el profesor (the teacher )
el lapicero (the pen)
el avión (the airplane)


la mesa (the table)
la canción (the song)
la profesora (the lady teacher)
la ciudad (the city)

*remember that words with -ción, -sión, -dad, -tad, -umbre. are feminine words.


Plural: for plural nouns the articles are los for masculine nouns and las for feminine:
los perros (the dogs)
los profesores (the teachers)
los lapiceros (the pens)
los aviones (the airplanes)

las mesas (the tables)
las canciones (the songs)
las mujeres (the women)
las ciudades (the cities)

Some rules about masculine and femenine words:

- when the noun refers to persons, sometimes the noun do not change, but the article wil change depending of the person's gender you are talking about:
El estudiante --- la estudiante
El pianista ---- la pianista
el cantante ---- la cantante


- the nouns which end in -sión, -ción, -dad, -tad, -tud, -umbre, are femine words:

• la televisión
• la decisión
• la conversación
• la habitación
• la ciudad
• la universidad

- some words that end in –a, or -ma are masculine:
el sistema

el poema

el día

el tema

el clima

el idioma
el planeta

el sofá

- some words which end in –o, are femenine:

La mano
La radio

Los Colores (The colours)

LOS COLORES - THE COLOURS
SPANISH - ENGLISH

rojo ---------red
naranja ------ orange
amarillo -------- yellow
verde ---------- green
azul ------------- blue
púrpura/morado ---purple
marrón --------- brown
negro ----------- black
gris ------------- grey
blanco ---------- white
rosa, rosado ------ pink
azul claro -------- light blue
celeste --------- pale blue, sky blue
azul oscuro -------- dark blue
dorado ------------ golden

plateado --------- silver

violeta --------- violet

Lesson 3 - Los Plurales

the plural is used for name two or more nouns of the same specie. Plurals in spanish are formed adding an "s" or "es" to the singular noun. here are the rules:

a) When the noun ends in a,e,o it's added an "s" at the end of the word for the plural.
Perro ---> Perros (dogs)
Gata ---> Gatas (cats)
mesa ---> mesas (tables)
Señora -----> señoras (ladies)
amigo -----> amigos (friends)

b) when a noun ends in i , it's added "es":
jabalí ---> jabalíes (wild boars)
israelí ---> israelíes (israelis)

c) when a noun ends in u, the plural could be with "s" or "es"
hindú ---> hindús, hindúes (hindis)
tabú ---> tabús, tabúes (taboos)

d) when the noun end in a consonant that is not it's added an "es"
Profesor ---> Profesores (teachers)
Señor ---> Señores (misters)
Televisión ---> televisiones (televisions)
Acción ---> acciones (actions)
compás ----> compases (dividers)

* note there's an accent in the last syllab, but the word ends in vowel, the accent is not written in the plural form.


e) when the noun ends in -z. the "z" is changed by an "c" and it's added "es" for the plural:
Lápiz ---> lápices (pencils)
Voz ----> voces (voices)

f) there are some nounes that end in -s or -x, that has no change to the plural:
tórax ----> tórax (torax)
tesis ----> tesis (thesis)


g) there's some special words which are singular words but give us an idea about a group of objects:
la gente (people, group of persons)
la jauría (group of dogs)
manada (group of animals)

*it's incorrect to say las gentes. You should say la gente.

Los animales (English- Spanish)

English-Spanish
ant ---------- hormiga
bear -------- oso
bee --------- abeja
bird --------- pájaro
bull ----------- toro
butterfly ------ mariposa
cat -------- gato
chameleon ------ camaleón
chicken ------- pollo
chimpanzee ------ chimpancé
cock -------- gallo
cow --------- vaca
crocodile ------ cocodrilo
dog --------- perro
dolphin ------ delfín
donkey -------burro
dove -------- paloma
duck ------- pato
eagle ------- águila
elephant ------ elefante
fish ---------- pez
fox --------- zorro
frog -------- rana
giraffe -------- jirafa
hen ----------- gallina

horse -------- caballo
lion ----------- león
mouse --------- ratón
parrot -------- loro
pig ----------- cerdo
rabbit ---------- conejo
rat ----------- rata
shark --------- tiburón
sheep -----------oveja
snake --------- la serpiente
spider -------- araña
tiger ----------- tigre
turkey ---------- pavo
turtle ----------- tortuga
wolf ------------- lobo
zebra ------------ cebra

Lesson 2 - Los sustantivos

The nouns in spanish could be masculine or femenine:

Masculine nouns: All nouns in masculine have a -o, -e, -i ending, the nouns which end in a consonante are also masculines:
libro (book)
perro (dog)
gato (cat)
elefante (el)
cuaderno (notebook)
piso (floor)

Femenine Nouns: femenine nouns have an -a ending:
- camisa (shirt)
- mesa (table)
- silla (chair)
- madera (wood)

Nouns refered to persons can change from masculine to femenine depending of the person you are talking about:

Comparison:
MASCULINO FEMENINO
profesor profesora
niño niña
señor señora


*it could be used with animals wich masculine noun end with -o like:
perro ---¨perra
gato ---- gata
elefante (it's the same for both genders)

there some special nouns that are different between their masculine and femenine form:
hombre -- mujer (man - woman)
caballero -- dama (gentleman - lady)
macho --- hembra (male - female)

Note:
words wich end in -ista. could be masculine or femine depending of the context, but içthey will never change:
periodista (journalist ) could be a man or a woman depending of the context.

Los números III

Learn the next numbers:

100 cien
200 doscientos
300 trescientos
400 cuatrocientos
500 quinientos
600 seiscientos
700 setecientos
800 ochocientos
900 novecientos
1000 mil

101 ciento uno
102 ciento dos
103 ciento tres
110 ciento diez
120 ciento veinte
121 ciento veintiúno
122 ciento veintidos
130 ciento treinta
146 ciento cuarenta y seis
157 ciento cincuenta y siete
382 trescientos ochenta y dos
571 quinientos setenta y uno

For the next numbers you use the same logic we learnt in the section before.

1,000 mil
2,000 dos mil
3,014 tres mil catorce
4,567 cuatro mil quinientos sesenta y siete

10,657 diez mil seiscientos cincuenta y siete
24,893 vienticuatro mil ochocientos noventa y tres
324,435 trescientos veinticuatro mil cuatrocientos treinta y cinco
1,000,000 un millón

Los números

This is a video for help you to prounce the numbers in spanish.

Spanish Sounds

This video shows some spanish words, for introduce the sounds of the spaniss letters in words, sound is very clear and it will give you a really good idea to know how to pronounce spanish in a right way. remember that spanish writting has a only one accent (´) called "tilde" the syllab which take the tilde, will be the stronger syllab of the word like fábrica FA-bri-ca

El Abecedario

This is a very interesting video, for help in the learning of the spanish alphabet. take into account thatin this video are mentioned to more letters ch (che) and ll(elle). they were part of the alphabet until some years ago, now words starting with these two letters are included in the "c" and "l" on the dictionaries.

ch sounds like the english ch (chinese)
ll you should pronounced like two "l" at the same time. for a better pronounciation you can practice saying ele-ele as faster as you can, trying to join this two sylabs.. in the case you cannot.. just pronounced it as a "y", there's a lot of native speakers that use to pronounce it as "y".. so don't be worried about it..

ñ is pronounces as an nh, in some regions people pronounce it as "enie" niño (ninio), it could be understood but it's incorrect.