Dummies.com: Education & Languages

Spanish Consonants

All but a handful of consonants sound the same in Spanish as they do in English. This video guides you through the consonants that are pronounced or used differently in Spanish. Practice pronouncing the [more…]

Grocery Shopping at a Spanish Supermarket

When you’re buying groceries at a Spanish supermarket, or supermercado(soo-pehr-mehr-kah-doh), it’s helpful to know some Spanish words and phrases related to shopping. [more…]

Talking about a Specific Time in Spanish

In Spanish, when you want to discuss when a particular event will occur, you can use a common Spanish phrase — ¿A qué hora . . . ? (At what time . . .?) [more…]

Making Equal Comparisons in Spanish

Comparisons of equality show that two things or people are the same. In Spanish, whether you’re using an adjective or an adverb, you make the comparison the same way. [more…]

Making Comparisons of Inequality in Spanish

Comparisons of inequality show that two things or people are not the same. It doesn’t matter whether you’re using an adjective or an adverb in Spanish; you make the comparison the same way. You create [more…]

Making Superlatives in Spanish Is the Best!

The superlative shows that something (or someone) is the best or worst of its (or his or her) kind. In Spanish, the article (el, la, los, las) that comes before [more…]

Ordering Up Ordinal Numbers in Spanish

Spanish speakers use ordinal numbers — those used to express numbers in a series — far less frequently than cardinal numbers, but ordinals still have some very important applications in everyday life. [more…]

Forming Spanish Questions with “¿Qué?” and “¿Cuánto?”

Spanish question words like ¿cuánto? and ¿qué? help you ask questions when you need to know how many or which of something to use. The following sections give you a crash course in using these helpful [more…]

Forming Spanish “Yes” and “No” Questions by Using Intonation, Tags, and Inversion

You can easily form Spanish questions by changing your voice intonation, adding a tag phrase to a sentence, or inverting the order of the subject and verb. Here’s how. [more…]

Identifying a Noun’s Gender in Spanish

The gender of nouns is always a stumbling point for people learning Spanish. In Spanish, nouns always take on a specific gender. This gender role is in addition to the traditional role nouns take on as [more…]

Knowing Where to Put Adjectives in Spanish Sentences

Placing adjectives in the right spot can be tricky in Spanish because different types of adjectives are positioned differently in a sentence. To help solve the mystery of Spanish adjectives, follow these [more…]

Creating Contractions with Articles in Spanish

Believe it or not, the entire Spanish language features only two contractions. And unlike English contractions, which never include the definite article [more…]

Using the Gender-Free Spanish Article Lo

The Spanish article lo (loh) is neuter, meaning it has no gender. So you don’t want to use it to indicate the gender of a subject as you would with its definite and indefinite article counterparts. Here’s [more…]

Omitting Articles in Spanish

In the Spanish language, articles are often useful to indicate a subject’s number and gender. However, in some cases, dropping Spanish articles is more efficient, which can make knowing when to leave them [more…]

How to Use the Spanish Preposition A

Using the Spanish preposition a(ah) correctly in a sentence can be tricky because a (which translates to to or atin English) can show a number of things. So how exactly can you figure out what the Spanish [more…]

How to Use the Spanish Preposition De

The Spanish preposition de (deh) has several meanings: of, from, or about, depending on your context. De’s multiple personalities make using the word correctly a bit tough — unless you know the specific [more…]

How to Use the Spanish Preposition En

Using the Spanish preposition en(ehn) correctly in a sentence can be tricky because en can mean in, by, or on. So how do you know how to translate a sentence that contains the preposition [more…]

Using the Spanish Preposition Hasta Correctly

The Spanish preposition hasta(ahs-tah) can mean either until or to, depending on the context of a sentence. Although still considered a common Spanish preposition, [more…]

Differentiating between Por and Para in Spanish

The prepositions por (pohr) and para (pah-rah) in Spanish cause a lot of problems when you’re trying to learn the language, because both words mean for [more…]

How to Use Spanish Subject Pronouns Correctly

Knowing how to use certain Spanish subject pronouns correctly can be confusing for a variety of reasons, including the fact that two different Spanish subject pronouns can have the same English meaning [more…]