How to learn the Spanish verb tenses: do’s and don’ts – Episode 95

How to learn the Spanish verb tenses: do’s and don’ts

Podcast episode 95 – SEE ALL EPISODES

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

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Today I’m answering a Spanish language question from a subscriber.

See also: Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses.

Today’s question is from Lee. He asks:

Are there any Spanish verb tenses or moods that I could safely not learn for now? Should I ignore the subjunctive, for example? I just find all the verb endings in Spanish so very hard to learn. 

What a great question. The quick answer to this is: yes, for now you can ignore the subjunctive and focus on other tenses that are going to help you make progress much faster.

And here’s the longer, more detailed answer:

As a teacher, and as a language learner myself, this is how I’d recommend that you tackle the verbs:

First, you need to get familiar with the present tense forms of the most common verbs. Many of those verbs are going to be irregular, so you need to study them one by one.

Some of the Spanish verbs you should be focusing on are: ser, estar, tener, querer, poder, decir, dar, hacer, saber, traer … And any others that you notice coming up frequently in your conversations. Then, you should learn the regular -ar, -er and -ir endings for the present tense.

This is, by far, the most important tense. Knowing the present tense well will make all other tenses much easier to learn. In particular the subjunctive tenses.

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Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses

Once you’re familiar with the present tense, start with the imperfect. It’s a very common tense, and it’s also one of the easiest to learn. It’s always motivating to learn things fast, so combining the more difficult tenses with the easier ones is a good idea.

After the imperfect, start familiarising yourself with the preterite. This is not an easy tense, but you’ll hear it all the time, so you’ll have plenty of opportunities to practise it.

Another two tenses that are easy to learn are the future and the conditional. They have a lot in common these two tenses, so learning them together will save you time and effort. I’d then move on to the reflexive verbs. Mastering the Spanish reflexive verbs will take a lot of practice, so now it’s a good time to start tackling them.

After that, start having a look at the continuous or progressive tenses. These are relatively easy to learn, so you’ll once again find yourself making fast progress.

Once you’re comfortable with the present, the imperfect, preterite, future, conditional, the reflexive verbs and the continuous forms, it’s time for the compound tenses.

Start with the present and past compound tenses, and then move on to the future and conditional; and, finally, it’s time for the subjunctive.

By the time you get to it, you’ll have come across it in your Spanish lessons. So you’ll have an idea of what it looks like. If you’ve learned the present tense well, learning the present subjunctive will be relatively easy.

Have a look at
Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses

To avoid making basic mistakes with tenses and verb endings, a good trick is to compare the different sets.

Let’s recap the order in which I recommend that you approach the Spanish verbs.

1. Start with the most common irregular verbs in the present tense.

2. Then focus on the regular -ar, -er and -ir endings for the present tense.

3. After that, start with the imperfect.

4. Then, move on to the preterite.

5. Then familiarise yourself with the future and conditional.

6. Then, start learning about the reflexive verbs. And then the continuous or progressive tenses. And then the compound tenses.

7. And, finally, it’s time for the subjunctive.

After I posted this question, one of my subscribers commented:

Going from one tense to another like that sounds impossible to me. Is there a way to make it less overwhelming?

I agree that if you only focus on learning new verb forms, you will not get very far. You’ll be so confused and frustrated after just three tenses that you’ll almost certainly give up.

Have a look at
Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses

To avoid overwhelm, a good trick is to have the occasional ‘review-only’ day. On those days, focus on going through the tenses you’ve learned so far. Don’t start any new verb lessons. Focus only on tenses you’re familiar with. And repeat the drills and exercises you’ve done before, even if you’re getting all the answers right.

Review-only days are great for discovering whether you’ve got any gaps in your knowledge. Or whether you need to slow down, or even speed up your verb learning.

In general, when studying the Spanish verbs, aim at putting as much time into reviewing as you do into learning new forms and tenses.

As you become familiar with more tenses and irregular verbs, reviewing becomes more and more essential.

There’s another interesting comment from a second subscriber who says:

I’d love to have something a bit more exciting than the verb book I’ve got at the moment. Is there a Spanish verb course you’d recommend?

That’s another very good question. A couple of years ago there was a great verb course I was recommending to all my students.

Unfortunately, the software used for that course has not been upgraded, so it’s incompatible with most computers. And it won’t work on any of your mobile devices.

Because there aren’t any good Spanish verb courses I can recommend, I’m creating one myself.

This summer I’ll be launching my Spanish course.

It’ll take you step by step through the main irregular verbs, and the verb tenses in the order I’ve laid out in this lesson.

You’ll have plenty of quizzes to practise as you go along. You’ll practise not only the individual verb forms, but also verb forms in context.

If, like me, you’ve ever gone through a whole verb book, you’ll know that it’s a very unexciting way of learning the verbs. A course like the one I’m creating takes a lot of the tedious work away.

Have a look at
Maria’s step-by-step Spanish courses

Like all my other Spanish courses, it’ll have plenty of recordings. Because learning the Spanish verb forms by listening to them has many advantages.

First, it’s a lot more entertaining. You’re likely to spend more time on your Spanish verbs if you can listen to the conjugations. Rather than simply having them on the page.

Also, listening to the verb forms will help you say them correctly.

Many Spanish verb forms are very similar to each other. The difference between many forms is just a few letters. Often just one vowel. So it’s important that you say them correctly.

Find out more about my Spanish courses.