Spanish Lesson Ninety-Six: Gender, Number, & Parts of Speech

Hi friends,

Thanks for joining me today in another Spanish. I know I've discussed continuing on next year with Portuguese, however, I've decided on a new route. In order to properly cultivate my creative writing, I will need all the more time to attend to the demands of the creative process. With that being said, I will no longer be writing for HubPages after Less One Hundred is complete. I will leave my site up and you can read as many of my hubs as you would like. I'm going to miss writing these weekly lessons.

I'm thankful for all the support over the past two years and hope that these lessons have supported your passion for the Spanish language. Thanks for everything! Let's get started on some review, shall we?

• To Review parts of speech
• To Review gender and number concerning adjectives and nouns
• To Reiterate pertinent grammatical details

• Person, Place, Thing, or Idea
• Masculine or Feminine
• Singular or Plural

Nouns are just the same as they are in English. They represent people, places, things, and ideas. In Spanish, however, there is a distinction that makes using nouns a bit more complex. Each noun has a gender that is either masculine or feminine.

Words that end in -a are considered feminine unless it is an exception to the rule. Words that are feminine include:

Fecha (Date)

Lámpara (Lamp)

Computadora (Computer)

There are some words that are unique such as:

Leche (Milk)

Verdad (Truth)

Vacación (Vacation)

Pasión (Passion)

Words that also end in -dad, -sion, and -cion are femine. While masculine words typically end in -o and can sometimes end in -e, -a, or others.

Muchacho (Boy)

Día (Day)

Lugar (Place)

Placer (Pleasure)

To change a masculine noun feminine, change the -o to an -a. This works on words that end in -o.

Muchacha (Girl)

To change number, simply add an -s or -es depending on the word.

Mujer--->Mujeres (Women)

Verdad--->Verdades (Truths)

Muchacho--->Muchachos (Boys

• -AR/-ER/-IR
• Reflects Number
• Reflects Tense
• Reflects Subject

Verbs in Spanish differ from those in English because they are in infinitive form. In English, an infinitive represents a phrase that says "to" prior to the verb. Thus Spanish verbs in their rawest form include the word "to" in their meaning.

Hablar (To Talk)

Escuchar (To Listen)

Leer (To Read)

Escribir (To Write)

If you will note, all verbs have a distinct ending. The last two letters of the word for the verb ending that determines whether the verb is an -AR/-ER/-IR verb. The verb must then be conjugated or changed to reflect the tense and the subject. In order to conjugate a verb, you must determine what tense you need to use, who is doing the action, and how many. Only then can you properly change a verb into the one of Fourteen Tenses, a Gerund, or a Participle.

• Descriptors
• Masculine or Feminine
• Singular or Plural
• Reflects Number
• Reflects Gender
• Reflects Subject

In English, Adjectives are used to describe a noun. This is the same for Spanish except there are some subtle differences. Adjectives, like nouns, must reflect gender. Also, these actives are placed after the noun instead of in front of the noun like in English.

Somos muchachos buenos. We are good guys. Note that the adjective was placed behind the noun and reflects the gender and number of the subject. To change an adjective's gender, simply change the -o to an -a for adjectives ending in -o.

Always ensure that your adjective agrees with the subject and number in order to be grammatically correct. The adjective comes AFTER the noun in mostly all cases. So ensure that your ordering of words is proper.

Next week, we will discuss Adverbs, Conjunctions, Prepositions, and Pronouns. Make sure you stick around for that review!

Lesson Ninety-Seven: Vocabulary Review #2 (8/4)

Lesson Ninety-Eight: Vocabulary Review #3 (8/11)

Lesson Ninety-Nine: The Benefits of Being Bilingual (8/18)

Lesson One Hundred: Farewell Spanish Learners! (8/25)