Benny Lewis's Blog, page 30

“Food” in Japanese: The Ultimate Guide to Japanese Cuisine

Food in Japanese is 食べ物 (tabemono). Japan is well-known for its incredible cuisine, and Japanese food is an art form, with chefs spending years perfecting their craft.

And the food in Japan is unlike anything most Westerners have had before, with ingredients like octopus, natto, and roe (fish eggs).

But don’t let that intimidate you -- Japanese food is an absolute treat. If you’re planning a trip to Japan, then you need to spend some time learning about the food and food culture.

Because not only is Japanese cuisine painstakingly created, there’s tons of unique etiquette. And some places won’t have an English menu, so it’s best to learn some food vocab and what’s-what so you can come hungry and prepared.

So in this article, we’ll do just that. You’ll learn about:

Table of contentsJapanese Food VocabularyFruit and VeggiesNuts, Grains, and Dairy ItemsMeat and ProteinCondiments and IngredientsDrinksJapanese-Specific FoodsFamous Japanese Dishes You Must TryCurry Rice: カレーライスOkonomiyaki: お好み焼きDonburi: 丼Shabu Shabu: しゃぶしゃぶRamenNatto: 納豆Tamagoyaki: 卵焼きVegan and Vegetarian Japanese Food OptionsJapanese Street Food Must-HavesSushi: Japanese Food EtiquetteJapanese Food Culture - How to Be Polite in a Japanese RestaurantItadakimasu! Enjoy Your Japanese Food!Japanese Food Vocabulary

Let’s start by learning with this Japanese food list of vocab. These Japanese food items will help you start building up your vocabulary to talk about Japanese food, find ingredients you need, and order at a restaurant.

Fruit and VeggiesApple: りんご (ringo)Banana: バナナ (banana)Strawberry: 苺 (ichigo) -- it’s sometimes also ストロベリー (sutoroberi-)Plum: 梅 (ume)Peach: もも (momo)Cherry: さくらんぼ (sakuranbo)Pear: なし (nashi)Watermelon: スイカ (suika)Grapes: 葡萄 (budou)Fruit: 果物 (kudamono)Vegetables: 野菜 (yasai)Carrots: ニンジン (ninjin)Potato: じゃがいも (jagaimo)Beans: 豆 (mame)Corn: トウモロコシ (toumorokoshi)Cucumber: キュウリ (kyuuri)Garlic: ニンニク (ninniku)Onion: 玉ねぎ (tamanegi)Pumpkin: カボチャ (kabocha)Radish: 蕪 (kabu)Peppers: ピーマン (pi-man)Mushrooms: きのこ (kinoko)Nuts, Grains, and Dairy ItemsRice: 米 (kome), if uncooked; 飯 (meshi) or ご飯 (gohan) when cooked*Bread: パン (pan)Wheat: 麦 (mugi)Grains: 穀物 (kokumotsu)Walnuts: クルミ (kurumi)Almonds: アーモンド (a-mondo)Nuts: 木の実 (konomi)Sesame seeds: 胡麻 (goma)Dairy: 乳製品 (nyuuseihin)Milk: 牛乳 (gyuunyuu) or ミルク (miruku)Butter: バター (bata-)Yogurt: ヨーグルト (yo-guruto)Rice is such a staple of every meal in that when it’s cooked, it’s usually called ご飯 (gohan) or 飯 (meshi). These words are also used to say “meal” or “food” respectively.Meat and ProteinMeat: 肉 (niku)Beef: 牛肉 (gyuuniku)Chicken: 鶏肉 (toriniku) or just 鶏 (tori)Pork: 豚肉 (butaniku) or just 豚 (buta)Fish: 魚 (sakana)Shrimp: 海老 (ebi)Tuna: 鮪 (maguro)Eel: 鰻 (unagi)Eggs: 卵 (tamago)Tofu: 豆腐 (toufu)Condiments and IngredientsFood: 食べ物 (tabemono)Ingredients: 食材 (shokuzai)Soy sauce: 醬油 (shouyu)Broth: 出汁 (dashi)*Rice wine vinegar: みりん (mirin)Salt: 塩 (shio)Pepper: 胡椒 (koshou) or ペッパー (peppa-)Sugar: 砂糖 (satou)Dashi is broth, but it’s different than your standard chicken or beef broth. Dashi is usually made with 昆布 (konbu, “kelp”), bonito flakes, shrimp, or sardines.DrinksDrinks: 飲み物 (nomimono)Coffee: コーヒー (ko-hi-)Tea: 茶 (cha)Black tea: 紅茶 (koucha)Green tea: 緑茶 (ryokucha)Cola: コーラ (ko-ra)Water: 水 (mizu)Beer: ビール (bi-ru)Wine: ワイン (wain)Sake: お酒 (osake)Japanese-Specific FoodsJapanese citrus fruit: 柚子 (yuzu)Japanese melon: 夕張メロン (yuubari meron)Japanese sweet potato: さつまいも (satsumaimo)Quail eggs: うずらの卵 (uzura no tamago)Pollack roe: 明太子 (mentaiko)Sticky rice cakes: 餅 (mochi)Sweet red bean paste: あんこ (anko)Famous Japanese Dishes You Must Try

Japanese cuisine is called 和食 (washoku), and there’s tons of famous Japanese food that you need to try when you go to Japan!

Of course, you’ll want to familiarize yourself with the Japanese food names and what they mean. That way you know what you’d like to order when exploring Japan or at your local Japanese restaurant.

So let’s talk about some traditional Japanese food.

Curry Rice: カレーライス

When you think of the national dish of Japan, you probably thought it’d be ramen or sushi. But actually, it’s curry rice!

カレーライス (kare-raisu) isn’t quite like Indian curry though. In fact, it’s more like a beef stew. It’s a popular homecooked meal made with meat and veggies in a thick gravy-like curry sauce and paired with rice.

Okonomiyaki: お好み焼き

お好み焼き (okonomiyaki) translates as “grilled how you like”. It’s a pancake mixed with whatever ingredients you’d enjoy.

Popular toppings are seafood, meat, veggies (especially cabbage), scallions, and cheese. But you can add anything you want to it. These ingredients are mixed into the batter and fried up.

There are a lot of okonomiyaki restaurants. Usually, you’ll cook the pancakes yourself with a grill at the center of the table.

Donburi: 丼

丼 (donburi) means “bowl”, specifically a bowl of rice that’s topped with food. There are many different variations of donburi, such as 牛丼 (gyuudon) with sliced meat in a soy sauce-based broth.

Another staple is 親子丼 (oyakodon) which literally means “parent and child bowl” -- because it’s made with chicken and egg.

カツ丼 (katsudon) is another of the most popular variations, with tonkatsu, fried pork, in tsuyu broth. Tsuyu is a combo of bonito flakes, soy sauce, kombu, and sake or mirin.

Shabu Shabu: しゃぶしゃぶ

しゃぶしゃぶ (shabu shabu) is the Japanese onomatopoeia sound for swishing. This dish gets its name from swishing the meat around in the sauce.

Shabu shabu is a hotpot dish. Hotpot is super popular in Japan with many variations, like sukiyaki, but this is one of the most popular. It’s made by cooking each ingredient one by one at the table. Starting with meat that’s been dipped in ponzu sauce and dashi, and then adding veggies and tofu or cabbage last.

Ramen

It’s way more than the instant noodles you’re used to! Traditional ramen in Japan has a rich history and artistry to it, with the food carefully placed in each bowl.

Ramen in Japan often has different regional flavors, some with a salt-based broth, miso broth, tonkotsu pork broth, or a shouyu soy sauce broth.

The noodles are topped with different ingredients, such as slices of meat, nori (seaweed), a soft-boiled egg, onions, and veggies.

If you’re an anime fan, you’ve probably seen a little white and pink swirly shape in the ramen bowls. That’s called 鳴門巻き (narutomaki) or just ナルト (naruto). It’s a type of kamaboko, or fish surimi (fish paste).

Of course, it’s featured on the show Naruto all the time, but its name derives from the Naruto whirlpools between Awaji Island and Shikoku.

In text, you’ll often see it called “@” or with the emoji 🍥.

Natto: 納豆

納豆 (nattou) is probably the most love-it-or-hate-it food in Japan. There’s no middle ground with this traditional Japanese food. You either love natto or you’re repulsed by it.

Why such a strong reaction to soybeans? Because these soybeans are fermented, giving them a super strong smell and sticky, stringy, slimy texture. Some people say natto smells moldy, like old cheese or ammonia.

Yeah, it doesn’t sound too appetizing described like that. But natto has a powerful umami flavor that some people can’t get enough of.

Tamagoyaki: 卵焼き

卵焼き (tamagoyaki) means “fried egg”, but it’s way more than that. This is one of my very favorite Japanese dishes because it gives a whole new flavor to eggs that we don’t have in the West.

Tamagoyaki is a rolled egg omelet, made with dashi, shouyu, sugar, and sometimes nori.

You beat all the ingredients together, and then roll it in a frying pan in layers, being careful not to brown it. Once it’s done, you pat it dry with a paper towel and squeeze out excess moisture. Then you slice it up into rolls resembling sushi.

In fact, you’ve probably seen this before if you’re an anime or manga fan. This is a bento box staple!

Vegan and Vegetarian Japanese Food Options

It can be hard to figure out what you can eat in Japan or at a Japanese restaurant if you’re vegetarian or vegan. But there IS such a thing as vegetarian and vegan Japanese food!

There are different ways people eat vegetarian (although I know purists would argue that there isn’t). Some don’t eat meat or eggs, but eat dairy. Some eat eggs. Some don’t eat any animal products at all.

So, keeping that in mind, here’s a list of some options for vegetarian Japanese food and vegan food. Make it work for you!

One note here. The hardest part of eating vegetarian or vegan in Japan isn’t that there aren’t meat-free options, but that most foods are cooked with dashi. This broth base contains fish usually (but not always).

Vegetable tempura is a delicious option for ovo-vegetarians. The batter usually contains eggs, however, and you’ll want to use soy sauce instead of the dipping sauce that comes with it (it contains fish).Mos Burger is a huge Japanese food chain -- the healthy McDonald’s of Japan. They have vegetarian burgers.Dango are grilled rice balls on a stick served from Japanese street food stands. They have vegetarian options.Gyoza are potstickers, and they’re usually filled with meat. But you can often find vegan options filled with mushrooms, veggies, or tofu.Soba noodles are a vegan option, as long as you get plain soy sauce for dipping.Ramen and udon shops are starting to offer more vegetarian and vegan options throughout Japan, with vegetables and vegetable-based broth.Okonomiyaki can often be made vegetarian, as long as you’re okay with egg and milk in the batter.Onigiri is a Japanese rice ball snack wrapped in nori. The inside is usually stuffed, and some are vegan. So look for umeboshi (pickled plum), plain, or red bean filling.Sushi can be made vegetarian with pickled or fresh veggies or tofu.Kabocha korroke is a pumpkin croquette that is usually vegetarian.

These phrases will be helpful for you when navigating Japanese food in Japan as a vegetarian or vegan:

肉が食べられません。 Niku ga taberaremasen. “I can’t eat meat.”

畜産物を食べません。 Chikusanmono wo tabemasen. “I don’t eat animal products.”

ベジタリアンです。 Bejitarian desu. “I’m vegetarian.”

ビーガンです。 Bi-gan desu. “I’m vegan.”

_ なしでお願いします。 _ nashi de onegai shimasu. “Without _, please.”

Japanese Street Food Must-Haves

Hot Japanese food fresh off a street food stand is simply the best and a must-try if you’re visiting Japan. These stands are called 屋台 (yatai). They offer delicious, high-quality food at a very reasonable price.

Here are some popular Japanese foods to keep an eye out for to try:

Takoyaki are fried little balls of batter and pieces of タコ (tako, “octopus”). It’s a Japanese staple!Yakitori are grilled chicken skewers that come in a variety of delicious seasonings and flavors.Yakiimo is a grilled sweet potato. In case you can’t tell, many foods include yaki (焼), which means it’s grilled.Kare Pan is a deep-fried bun filled with Japanese curry.Dorayaki is one you may have seen the popular character Doraemon eat often. These are sweet buns filled with red bean paste.Taiyaki is another popular one you may have seen in anime before. They’re fish-shaped cakes filled with custard usually, but can have a variety of fillings.Japanese crepes (クレープ, kure-pu) are to-die-for. Take a look at the amazing varieties and tell me your mouth isn’t watering. Japanese crepes are the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my life.Sushi: Japanese Food Etiquette

You may think sushi is just sushi -- but it’s far from it. In fact, sushi food is in its own category for etiquette.

Sushi dishes have quite a variety as well. Here are the common choices you have to choose from:

Maki: This is what you probably think of when it comes to sushi. This is your rolls with rice, filling, and wrapped in seaweed.Sashimi: This is a cut of fish or shellfish with nothing else.Nigiri: This is a cut of fish or shellfish over rice (usually). But it can be any single topping over rice. For instance, A5 wagyu beef (the highest quality of beef in the world) is sometimes served nigiri-style.Uramaki: Rice on the outside, seaweed wrap on the inside holding the fillings together.

There are others as well, but these are the most “traditional” ones.

In Japan, 板前 (itaemae, chef) train for years as an apprentice before becoming a sushi chef. It’s an art form that’s taken very seriously, and as such, gets its own manners and rules around eating it.

Here are some rules to keep in mind:

Don’t rub your chopsticks together, it’s considered rude.When not using your chopsticks, place them on your chopstick holder (called 箸置き, hashioki) or across your shouyu bowl.When picking up food off the communal plate or someone else’s plate, flip your chopsticks around. Use the wider end that hasn’t been in your mouth to grab the food.Don’t mix wasabi into your soy sauce.Don’t dip your sushi rice-first into your soy sauce. Dip the fish side in.It’s okay to eat nigiri or maki with your hands. But sashimi should only be eaten with chopsticks.Eat sushi in one bite. It’s not polite to take a bite out and have it fall apart.Don’t put ginger on your sushi. It’s a palate cleanser to use in between different sushi rolls.Sushi is not meant to be taken to-go.Don’t leave a messy plate, and don’t leave a bunch of soy sauce in your dish. It’s considered rude. Eat all your food and use what you need.

In general, keep in mind the itamae has worked many years to perfect the craft. Trust his or her judgement. Be mindful that the chef has taken care to make sure the sushi is well-balanced and rolled well. So you don’t want to tear apart the roll, add too many extra flavors, or leave food behind.

Japanese Food Culture - How to Be Polite in a Japanese Restaurant

Besides what we’ve already talked about, there are some other aspects of Japanese food culture that are helpful to know.

For example, you should never stick your chopsticks straight up in your rice or place them across your bowl or plate. You should only use the hashioki, the chopstick holder, when you’re not using them.

And you should never pass food from chopsticks to chopsticks. It’s similar to a ritual done when someone passes away, so it’s considered bad luck.

Slurping your ramen or udon noodles shows you find it delicious and isn’t considered rude. But make sure not to leave a mess! Japanese culture is all about cleanliness.

When something’s delicious, or someone’s made you food, it’s polite to express how delicious it is. You can say “美味しい!” (oishii) or “うまい!” (umai), which mean “delicious” or “great”.

When you’re done eating, set your napkin next to your plate and leave your plate empty. You don’t tip in Japan -- and it’ll often confuse the servers if you try -- so you don’t have to worry about that.

Lastly, it’s polite to say いただきます (itadakimasu) before a meal, which means something like “bon appetit.” When you’re done, you should say ごちそうさまでした (gochisousama deshita), which means “thanks for this meal.” You’ll say that to the sushi chef, the people who dined with you, the person who made the food, or who paid for it.

Itadakimasu! Enjoy Your Japanese Food!

You’re ready to go explore the delicious world of Japanese cuisine now. You won’t regret being a bit adventurous with your food choices and trying new things! Food in Japan is amazing.

Now that you’ve prepped for your foodie adventures, why not learn some other Japanese phrases for travel? Or if you plan to study abroad in Japan, learn about studying in a Japanese classroom and vocab you need to know.

The post “Food” in Japanese: The Ultimate Guide to Japanese Cuisine appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

Preply Review – a Detailed and Honest Review of the Preply Language Tutor Platform

Quick review: Preply makes it easy to find, schedule and connect with native speakers who want to chat with you in your target language. Every tutor I’ve learned with on the platform has been exceptional. Highly recommended.

In the Preply review that follows, I’ll explain what I liked about this online language tutoring service. I’ve included screenshots, personal experience, and videos. I want to help you figure out whether Preply is a good fit for you as a language learner, and how you can make the most of it.

If you want to learn a language with a top-notch tutor, you can join Preply here.

Let’s get started!

Table of contentsPreply OverviewWhat is Preply?PriceLanguagesPreply: The GoodPreply: What Could be BetterWhat is Preply?How Preply WorksHow I Used Preply for this ReviewWhat I Like about PreplyPreply Guarantees SatisfactionPreply Covers 27 Languages with Tutors from 185 CountriesWith Preply, You Can Learn AnytimeTest Your LevelEmail RemindersWhat I Most Love about Preply - the Tutors!Preply: What Could be BetterThe Best Resource for Learning a Language Is a Native SpeakerPreply Review Conclusion: ExcellentPreply Overview

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 Stars

What is Preply?

Preply is a website that connects language students with private tutors. Language lessons take place online in a virtual classroom. All you need is a computer, WiFi and a sense of adventure.

Price

Lessons range in price from $4 to $40 for a 30-60 minute lesson.

Languages

Preply has tutors available for 27 languages from 185 countries around the world. All major languages are covered.

Preply: The GoodHigh quality tutors - all of those I’ve had a lesson with have been exceptionalVariety of tutors available in commonly taught languages. There are also quite a few in less studied languages.Discounts on larger lesson packagesTheir customer service is easy to reach. They offer email and instant chat support.Scheduling a lesson is easy.Preply: What Could be BetterLimited flexibility on lesson packagesI’m not a fan of placement testsWhat is Preply?

Preply is an online service that connects private language students with language tutors. Their website promises that it will help you:

Find affordable language tutors onlinePrepare to speak confidently in your new languageMake the world your comfort zoneSpeak naturallyFocus on the skills you needPrepare to achieve your goals with private tutors

Once you connect with a tutor, you’ll arrange a time that’s suitable for both of you to meet 1-1 for a language lesson. This could be a structured lesson or an informal conversation in your target language. It’s up to you and what you want to achieve.

Lessons are between 30 and 60 minutes in length. Prices range from $4 to $40 for a lesson, so there are tutors available to support any budget.

To try Preply for yourself and learn a language with a top-notch tutor, you can join Preply here.

How Preply Works

Here are the four steps to follow when you use Preply:

Find a tutor. Preply has over 49,000 tutors. You can browse tutors using various filters, or search using the search bar.Take lessons anytime. It’s easy to schedule a lesson, and with tutors all around the world, there’s always one to match your schedule.Enter a virtual classroom on Preply’s platform - it’s similar to a call on Zoom, and it works in your web browser.Enjoy structured learning. Preply will keep track of your learning progress. You can choose structured learning plans or just get conversation practice.How I Used Preply for this Review

I first used Preply several years ago to learn French. So, before I was assigned to write this review, I was familiar with the platform, and I knew it worked well for me.

For this review, I used Preply to study Spanish, Vietnamese and American Sign Language. I also completed a placement test for Spanish.

What I Like about Preply

You can probably tell I like Preply a lot! I’ll start by going through the things I like about the platform, before covering a couple of the drawbacks I’ve found. Let’s get started!

Preply Guarantees Satisfaction

Preply guarantees that you will find a perfect match with a tutor who meets your needs. And they put their money where their mouth is. If you don’t like your first lesson with a tutor, you can schedule a second trial lesson for free.

I don’t know if there is a limit to the free trial lessons because I quickly found a tutor that I connected with.

I recommend that you try out a range of tutors, and when you find a tutor you like, stick with them. If you want to truly learn the language, you will need to create an action plan with one or two regular tutors.

For my target language, I usually have three tutors in rotation:

one is for conversation practiceone is for structured lessonsone is a substitute for when my other tutors go on vacation.

Being able to trial different tutors on Preply means I’m easily able to find a tutor that fits my needs.

Preply Covers 27 Languages with Tutors from 185 Countries

There are 23 languages listed on the Preply drop-down menu.

Their website states that they have over 27 languages available. I found some by typing them into the search bar. For example, Vietnamese is not listed but there are tutors available.

I appreciate this variety. With almost 50,000 language tutors registered on the platform also means that you’ll have lots of options when you’re looking for a new teacher.

Here are the most popular languages on Preply, with the number of tutors listed at the time of writing:

English - 19915 teachersSpanish - 9982 teachersGerman - 1007 teachersFrench - 2315 teachersItalian - 3135 teachersRussian - 1679 teachersArabic - 1114 teachersJapanese - 906 teachersChinese - 2499 teachersWith Preply, You Can Learn Anytime

Because you have access to teachers all over the world, you can pretty much have a lesson anytime of the day or night. It’s language hour somewhere!

It’s quite simple to find a tutor to match your needs. All you need to do is type the language you would like to learn into the “I want to learn…” search bar.

There are a number of different filters you can select.

Price Per Hour: This ranges from $4-$40. Country: You can choose where your tutors lives. This helps when you need to learn specific dialects of a target language. Time of Day and/or Day of Week: Let’s say you are a morning person. Well, you can select a filter that will show you tutors that are also up at the crack of dawn. Expert Areas: This is a large drop-down menu with options like business language, lessons for children and lessons for dyslexic students. Also Speaks: If you want to learn German while also practicing your Mandarin, you can select a tutor that speaks both of those languages.

I was amazed at how easy it was to find a tutor that matched my availability and was suitable for my level.

Test Your Level

Preply offers free placement tests. Students are always asking me how they can evaluate their level. Well, here you go!

Email Reminders

I was easily able to sync my Google calendar with the Preply appointments. I also received a friendly email reminder of my upcoming appointment.

What I Most Love about Preply - the Tutors!

The tutors are top-notch. Before trying Preply, I had over 450 one-on-one language lessons. During those lessons I tried nearly 60 tutors. Yeah, I know! That’s a lot of lessons. All this to say, I know what I like.

The quality of tutors on other websites are hit or miss. Every tutor I tried on Preply was remarkably effective. On Preply, I tried tutors in French, Vietnamese, Spanish and American Sign Language. Each one was exceptional.

Preply screens every tutor that joins the site, and it seems they’ve put together a great system. They’ve got some serious pixie dust that attracts the best tutors to their site.

To try Preply for yourself and learn a language with a top-notch tutor, you can join Preply here.

Preply: What Could be Better

There are a couple of things where my experience could have been slightly improved with Preply. These are far from being deal breakers, but I want to share them in case they are for you.

First, the placement tests. While I know some language students find these valuable, I’m not a huge fan of placements tests as I don’t feel they judge your ability to have a solid conversation. I took the test but I didn’t find it to be helpful. My tutor never mentioned it during our lesson. So, I’m not sure if she listened to my audio responses.

Second is lesson packages. After your trial lesson with a tutor, Preply offers you the chance to buy a package of six lessons.

Yes, you can try out more than one tutor. Yes, the second lesson with a new tutor is free. But once you’ve found a good match, they ask you to commit to six lessons. I like to take my time committing to a tutor. I usually buy one lesson as a time for the first three lessons so I can see whether we’re a good fit.

Oftentimes, I don’t know whether the tutor is a match until lesson two or three. Once I’m convinced that a tutor has something I need, I’m more than willing to buy six lessons. But I prefer to take time with that decision.

Anyway, the good news is Preply’s excellent customer service helped out with this. I emailed them to request the ability to purchase single lessons until I decide the tutor is right for me. They agreed.

So, this is not a deal breaker, and it does depend on how you like to find a new tutor.

The Best Resource for Learning a Language Is a Native Speaker

As a language coach for the Fluent in 3 Months (Fi3M) Challenge, one of my favorite things to do is try out new learning tools. So I loved trying Preply! Especially so because like Fluent in 3 Months founder Benny Lewis, I learn new languages by speaking them.

Having real conversations with native speakers of your target language is one of the surest ways to gain fluency. Thanks to this method, I now speak conversational French and Spanish.

Most mornings, I get up, meditate, brush my teeth and have a language lesson before my work day begins. Learning a new language is much easier when you can do it from the couch. That’s what makes Preply such a powerful tool. You can connect with tutors and make new friends all around the world, from the comfort of your home.

Preply Review Conclusion: Excellent

If you’re new to language learning, speaking with a native speaker is essential. Preply makes it easy to find, schedule and connect with another human being. It’s an excellent tool and I highly recommend it for finding a language tutor.

To try Preply for yourself and learn a language with a top-notch tutor, you can join Preply here.

The post Preply Review – a Detailed and Honest Review of the Preply Language Tutor Platform appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

Spanish Irregular Verbs: The Ultimate Guide [with Charts]

Are Spanish irregular verbs giving you a headache?

Verbs are the biggest and most complicated topic in Spanish grammar. If you want to master them (especially if you want to master Spanish irregular verbs), you've got a lot to learn. But don't let that put you off.

In this article, we will look specifically at irregular verbs in Spanish. Here’s what we’ll cover:

Table of contentsWhat Are Irregular Verbs in Spanish?A Quick Recap of Spanish Regular VerbsThe 10 Most Common Spanish Irregular VerbsThe Spanish Irregular Verbs by Category: Stem-Changing VerbsTypes of Stem-Changing Verbs in SpanishSpanish Verbs With an Irregular "yo" FormIrregular "yo" form with no stem changeIrregular "yo" form with a stem changeSerHaberThe End of the Beginning

Don’t be put off if you’re a complete beginner: I won't assume much if any existing knowledge of Spanish grammar.

Ready? Vamos! (“Let’s go!”)

What Are Irregular Verbs in Spanish?

To understand the difference between regular and irregular verbs, it helps to take a closer look at how verbs work in English. They usually follow a pretty simple pattern. I'll illustrate it with the verb "to walk".

To use "to walk" in the present tense, you simply stick a pronoun in front of it: "I walk" or "they walk". The one exception is the third-person singular form (he/she/it), which has an "s" on the end: "he/she/it walks".

So far, so simple. Other tenses are just as easy: for the present continuous tense, you stick an "-ing" on the end of the verb and combine it with the present tense of the verb "to be", as in "he is walking". Or you can put an "-ed" on the end of the verb to make it past tense: "I walked". These aren't the only tenses, of course, but the point is that the different forms of the verb "to walk" are made using some simple, consistent patterns that can be applied to many other verbs:

walk, walks, walked, walkinghelp, helps, helped, helpingplay, plays, played, playingclimb, climbs, climbed, climbing

And so on.

Most English verbs follow this simple pattern; as such, they're known as regular verbs.

But then, there are verbs like "to speak".

This word doesn't follow the pattern above; its past-tense version is not "speaked" but "spoke". Similarly, "to buy" becomes "bought", not "buyed", and "to throw" becomes "threw", not "throwed". These are just a few of the many, many English verbs that don't play by the normal rules. These are the irregular verbs.

Spanish is similar. There are some basic patterns that most verbs - the regular verbs - follow, but there are also many irregular exceptions. If you want to communicate effectively in Spanish, you need to learn which verbs are irregular, and what their irregularities are.

But before we get deeper into the verbs that break the rules, let's review those rules.

A Quick Recap of Spanish Regular Verbs

Remember that Spanish verbs (regular or irregular) can be divided into three categories, based on the ending of their infinitive form:

"-ar" verbs, such as hablar (to speak), cantar (to sing), and bailar (to dance)"-er" verbs, such as deber (to owe), correr (to run), and comprender (to understand)"-ir" verbs, such as vivir (to live), existir (to exist), and ocurrir ("to happen")

The regular present tense forms in each case are:

 hablardeberviviryo (I)hablodebovivotú (you, singular informal)hablasdebesvivesél/ella/usted (he/she/you, singular formal)habladebevivenosotros (wehablamosdebemosvivimosvosotros/vosotras (you, plural informal)habláisdebéisvivísellos/ellas/ustedes (they/they/you, plural formal)hablandebenviven

(Remember that the vosotros form is only used in Spain; in Latin America, use ustedes.)

Hopefully you've spotted some of the patterns. For example, the first-person singular forms all end with -o, and the second-person singular forms all end with -s.

You'll spot similar patterns when you learn the rest of the tenses. For example, in the first-person plural (the "we" form of the verb), Spanish verbs always end in "-mos" no matter what the tense:

corremos - we runcorrimos - we rancorreremos - we will runcorríamos - we were running

I won't go into depth here about all the different patterns and regularities you can find in Spanish verbs. Just remember this when you hear that a single Spanish verb can have almost 100 different forms. It's not as scary as it sounds: learn to spot the patterns, and it'll drastically reduce the amount of memorisation that you need to do.

While irregular verbs are less regular (duh), you tend to see the same sorts of patterns. No matter how weird an irregular verb is, you can still expect that the first-person plural form will end in -mos. Or, with very few exceptions, the first-person singular form will end in -o.

Bear this in mind as we explore the wild and wonderful world of Spanish irregular verbs. Always be on the lookout for the shortcuts that will make everything easier to learn.

The 10 Most Common Spanish Irregular Verbs

Unfortunately, while most of Spanish verbs are regular, irregular verbs tend to also be the common verbs that get used the most often.

Here’s a list of 10 of the most common Spanish irregular verbs:

ser - “to be”haber - auxiliary “to be/to have”estar - “to be”tener - “to have”ir - “to go”saber - “to know”dar - “to give”hacer - “to make”poder - “to can/to be able to”decir - “to say”

This makes sense when you think about it: the more often a word is said, the more chances it’s had to change and evolve over the centuries.

But let's think about English irregular verbs again for a second. There are many of them - but sometimes you find groups of words which all follow the same pattern, like “blow, blew”, “throw, threw”, and “know, knew”.

If you remember that these words all go together, you can learn them as a single unit.

Thankfully, Spanish irregular verbs can often be grouped like this too. So let's look at the most important groups to learn.

The Spanish Irregular Verbs by Category: Stem-Changing Verbs

The simplest irregular verbs in Spanish are the so-called stem-changing verbs. They're easy to learn.

The "stem" of a verb is the part you get when you remove infinitive suffix (that is, the -ar, -er, or -ir) from the infinitive form. So the stems of hablar, deber, and vivir are habl-, deb-, and viv-.

When dealing with regular verbs, you never change the stem. All you do is remove the infinitive suffix and add an ending like -o or -as.

Many verbs, however, are more complicated. I’ll show you with an example.

Here are the present-tense endings of cerrar ("to close"). Pay close attention to the stem:

cierro - I closecierras - you (s.) closecierra - he/she closescerramos - we closecerráis - you (pl.) closecierran - they close

Do you see what's going on?

In the first, second, third, and sixth forms, the vowel in the stem changes from e to ie. Other than that, everything is as normal - the endings are what you would expect if the verb was regular.

It might seem confusing that the stem only changes in four of the six verb forms. To understand why this is the case, focus on the -amos/-áis forms. The stem is unstressed: in both of these cases, the stress goes on the second syllable.

The vowel in the stem of a stem-changing verb only changes in those conjugations where that vowel is stressed. In practice, you only need to know that these are the yo, tú, él/ella and ellos/ellas forms.

But it's better if you understand why this is the case. It's as if you're "stressing" the vowel so hard that it breaks apart into two pieces.

To understand why the stem's vowel is stressed in some verb forms and unstressed in others, see this detailed explanation of accents and word stress in Spanish.

Types of Stem-Changing Verbs in Spanish

There are three main types of stem-changing verbs in Spanish.

There are also a few weird ones which don't fit into those three main categories, but we’ll talk about them later in the post. I'll start with the categories.

First of all, you have verbs which change an e to an ie. We've already seen cerrar above, which follows this pattern. Some of the most important similar verbs are:

acertar - to guessadvertir - to advise, warnatender - to attend toatravesar - to crosscalentar - to warm/heat (up)cerrar - to closecomenzar - to beginconfesar - to confessconsentir - to consentconvertir - to convertdefender - to defenddescender - to descenddespertarse - to wake updivertirse - to have fun, enjoy oneselfempezar - to begin, startencender - to lightencerrar - to enclose, encircleentender - to understandfregar - to scrubgobernar - to governhelar - to freezehervir - to boilmentir - to lienegar - to denynevar - to snowpensar - to thinkperder - to losepreferir - to preferrecomendar - to recommendremendar - to mendsentar(se) - to sit downsentir - to feelsugerir - to suggesttropezar - to stumble, trip

Secondly, verbs which change an o to a ue. For example, here's colgar ("to hang") in the present tense:

cuelgo - I hangcuelgas - you (s.) hangcuelga - he/she/it hangscolgamos - we hangcolgáis - you (pl.) hangcuelgan - they hang

Here are some more examples from this category:

absolver - to absolveacordarse (de) - to agree onalmorzar - to eat lunchaprobar - to approvecocer - to bakecolgar - to hangconmover - to move (emotionally)contar - to count, to tellcostar - to costdemoler - to demolishdemostrar - to prove, demonstratedevolver - to return (an object)disolver - to dissolvedoler - to hurtdormir - to sleepencontrar - to findenvolver - to wrapllover - to rainmoler - to grindmorder - to bitemorir - to diemostrar - to showmover - to move (an object)poder - to be able toprobar - to prove, sample, testpromover - to promoterecordar - to rememberremover - to removeresolver - to resolveretorcer - to twistrevolver - to mix, shakerogar - to beg, praysoler - to be accustomed to, to usually be/dosonar - to sound, ringsoñar - to dreamtener - to havetorcer - to twisttostar - to toasttronar - to thundervolar - to flyvolver - to return (from somewhere)

The third common category of stem-changing verb is that of verbs that change an e to an i. For example, corregir ("to correct"):

corrijo - I correctcorriges - you (s.) correctcorrige - he/she correctscorregimos - we correctcorregís - you (pl.) correctcorrigen - they correct

Here's the list you should learn:

colegir - to deducecompetir - to competeconseguir - to get, obtaincorregir - to correctdecir - to saydespedir - to dismiss, fire, say goodbye toelegir - to electfreír - to frygemir - to groan, moanimpedir - to impedemedir - to measurepedir - to ask for, orderperseguir - to follow, pursue, persecuterepetir - to repeatreír(se) - to laughseguir - to follow, continueservir - to servesonreír(se) - to smilevestir(se) - to get dressed

And finally, here are the weird stem-changing verbs that don't quite fit into the above categories.

First, the verb oler ("to smell" - either to smell an object, such as a flower, or to emit an odour). This might look like a o to ue stem-changing verb, but when the stem changes, you must add an "h" to the beginning:

huelo - I smellhueles - you smellhuele - he/she/it smellsolemos - we smelloléis - you (pl.) smellhuelen - they smell

(Remember that an "h" in Spanish is always silent, so this extra letter doesn't have any effect on the pronunciation.)

Second, the verb jugar. It’s the only example of a verb whose stem changes from a u to a ue:

juego - I playjuegas - you (s.( playjuega - he/she/it playsjugamos - we playjugáis - you (pl.) playjuegan - they play

Third, two verbs exist that change an "i" to an "ie". They are adquirir (to acquire) and inquirir (to inquire). So in the first-person singular they're adquiero and inquiero, respectively. Can you figure out the other five present-tense forms of adquirir and inquirir? Hopefully by now it should be easy.

Spanish Verbs With an Irregular "yo" Form

I told you earlier that decir ("to say") is an e- to -i stem-changing verb. But it’s not only that. Decir is also one of a small number of verbs which has a non-standard yo form.

Remember that yo means "I". "I say" is (yo) digo, which isn't what you'd expect if you followed the rules above.

To be clear, here are all six present-tense forms of decir:

digo - I saydices - you (s.) saydice - he/she saysdecimos - we saydecís - you (pl.) saydicen - they say

As you can see, the first form uses the weird -go suffix. The rest of the forms proceed as normal, subject to the stem changes that I already explained.

Several other common Spanish verbs follow this pattern in the present tense. The first-person singular form is irregular; all other forms are either regular or, as in the case of decir, have a stem change.

Here's what you need to learn. For each verb, I'll give the infinitive, the first-person singular (which is irregular), and the second-person singular (so you can see the stem change, or lack of it).

Irregular "yo" form with no stem changeconocer - "to know" - yo conozco, tú conocesdar - "to give" - yo doy, tú dashacer - "to do, make" - yo hago, tú hacesponer - "to put" - yo pongo, tú ponessalir - "to exit" - yo salgo, tú salestraer - "to bring" - yo traigo, tú traesver - "to see" - yo veo, tú vesoír - "to hear" - yo oigo, tú oyessaber - "to know" - yo sé, tú sabesir - "to go" - yo voy, tú vasestar - "to be" - yo estoy, tú estáscaber - "to fit" - yo quepo, tú cabeslucir - "to wear" - yo luzco, tú lucesvaler - "to be worth" - yo valgo, tú valesIrregular "yo" form with a stem changedecir - "to say" - yo digo, tú dicestener - "to have" - yo tengo, tú tienesvenir - "to come" - yo vengo, tú vienesSer

It's time to look at the biggest and baddest of all Spanish irregular verbs: ser, which means "to be".

Like its English counterpart, ser is highly irregular - and not just in the first-person singular. Here are the six present-tense forms of ser:

soy - I ameres - you (s.) arees - he/she/it issomos - we aresóis - you (pl.) areson - they are

I recommend you learn these conjugations by memory as soon as possible. It's probably the most important irregular verb in Spanish, and it will show up in most of the sentences you’ll see, hear, read, or speak.

Haber

Another highly irregular (and important) verb is haber. The dictionary might tell you that haber means "to have", but this doesn't paint the full picture.

To say "I have a dog" in Spanish, you'd say "tengo un perro". Tengo, as we saw above, is the irregular first-person singular form of tener, and tener is the normal way to say "have" in this sense in Spanish.

So where does haber come in?

Think of an English sentence like "I have eaten ". The word "have" is doing something different here. It doesn't mean ownership or possession, which is what tener is for.

Instead it's a grammatical device that changes the tense of the word. In this case, it tells you that the action took place in the past.

This is the primary function of haber in Spanish: it's used in compound tenses, like the "have" in "I have eaten".

Here's how it's conjugated (and I'll stick with "eaten", comido, as my example):

he comido - I have eatenhas comido - you (s.) have eatenha comido - he/she/it has eatenhemos comido - we have eatenhabéis comido - you (pl.) have eatenhan comido - they have eatenThe End of the Beginning

This might seem like a lot, but you don’t need to learn everything now.

For one thing, if you still haven’t got a solid grasp of regular verb endings, you should work on that before worrying too much about irregular endings. If you need help with these, take a look at Benny’s post on the three main Spanish tenses.

When you feel ready, come back to these irregular endings, and, as always, don’t be afraid to make mistakes! If you forget which verbs are irregular, and say something like yo sabo instead of yo sé, people will still understand what you mean.

In fact, mistakes like “yo sabo” are common among children who are learning Spanish as their first language - which just goes to show, it doesn’t always come naturally even to native speakers!

The post Spanish Irregular Verbs: The Ultimate Guide [with Charts] appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

Learning Spanish in Argentina Was Key to My Fluency – Here’s Why

When it comes to learning a foreign language quickly, there are few methods greater than genuine cultural immersion.

Not only does integration into a new society provide a broad range of cultural insights, but it can also create long-lasting friendships and connections.

I am fortunate enough to have experienced this personally, having spent a year living and working in Argentina’s magnificent capital, Buenos Aires.

Despite three years studying the Spanish language scrupulously in lecture theatres, seminar rooms and libraries whilst at university, it was my period of residence in Argentina which enabled me to progress my Spanish at a truly rapid rate.

This article is a summary of my time in Argentina and, as I see it, proof that cultural immersion is so incredibly beneficial when it comes to language progression.

function runSplitTest(){var randomNumber = Math.floor(Math.random() * 2) + 1console.log(randomNumber)var copy = "";if (randomNumber == 1){ copy = '<i>One thing before we get started: You can chat away in Spanish for at least 15 minutes with the "Fluent in 3 Months" method. All it takes is 90 days. <b><a href="https://fluentin3months.com/challenge... this link to find out more.</b></a></i>'} else { copy = '<i>Before we get started, if you’re looking for an online Spanish course, here’s the course I recommend: <a href="https://www.fluentin3months.com/olly-... Uncovered - Learn Spanish Through the Power of Story</b></a>, a course with a fascinating new method by my friend Olly. You can try it for free for 7 days!</i>'}console.log(copy)var copyToChange = document.querySelector("p.copyText").innerHTML = copy;}runSplitTest();How learning Argentine Spanish Helped Me Improve My Language Skills – Let’s Talk About Grammar Differences

Admittedly, when I arrived in Argentina, I already had an intermediate level of Spanish. I had spent many weeks conversing with locals in Spain, and I had several Spanish friends at university in London. The inability to communicate in such a way upon arrival in Argentina, therefore, left me shocked and slightly perplexed.

It’s not that I expected the Spanish grammar I had learnt in school to be adopted by Spanish-speaking countries the world over — I suppose I’d never given it much thought. In hindsight, perhaps this was ignorant.

However, I had never been to a Spanish-speaking country outside of Spain before. So, Castilian Spanish (the Spanish spoken in most of mainland Spain) was all I really knew.

Anybody who has been to Argentina will know that Argentine Spanish is unique, and I found out the hard way.

In the present tense, Argentine verb conjugation is different from the majority of Spanish-speaking countries; the country adopts the voseo form, which comprises an accent on the final vowel of the conjugated form in the ‘you’ singular form.

Furthermore, the personal pronoun tú is replaced by vos and the conjugated eres is replaced by sos.

An example of this in practice with each verb group is as follows:

tú tomas (“you take”) becomes vos tomás – AR verbtú tienes (“you have”) becomes vos tenés – ER verbtú vives (“you live”) becomes vos vivís – IR verb

Firstly, you’ll notice that the verb tener maintains its stem and does not change to tienes. This is true of all stem changing verbs in the present tense in Argentine Spanish.

Secondly, there is an accent on the final vowel of each conjugation. As you’d expect, this alters the stress of the word and, as a result, the pronunciation is altered drastically.

This is symbolic of Argentine Spanish intonation in general, which I’ll cover in greater depth shortly.

How I Found Out These Differences the Hard Way

My first experience struggling with the main grammar differences in Argentina came upon arrival, when the receptionist at my hostel asked me:

¿Sos inglés? (“Are you English?”) and Qué edad tenés? (“How old are you?”)

This differs greatly to the phrases I had learnt in school: ¿Eres inglés? and ¿Cuántos años tienes?

Imagine the surprise when I stared back at her, mildly bemused, trying to figure out whether I had misheard the question.

This was, in fact, my first experience listening to, and indeed hearing, the voseo.

Soon after my arrival, I started my work placement at an international car rental company, and was asked initially by colleagues, ¿Vos vivís acá en Buenos Aires? (“Do you live in Buenos Aires?”)

Again, this left me blank-faced, frozen and unable to respond instantaneously, as I had become so used to doing in Spain.

I was waiting to be asked ¿Vives aquí en Buenos Aires?

Clearly, understanding one of these phrases by no means makes the other intelligible!

I was only a few weeks into my time in Argentina and I was yet to learn the voseo form, or any nuances and differences between South American Spanish vocabulary and European Spanish.

Acá, meaning here, is an example of this. If you speak Spanish, you’ll know that throughout almost all parts of Spain the word aquí is used instead of acá to say “here”.

I was shown other, more drastic examples of vocabulary differences during my time at work in Buenos Aires. I’ll never forget one of these in particular. An Argentine colleague asked me how I travelled to work, to which I replied:

Cogí el autobús (“I caught the bus”), using the past tense of the verb coger (“to catch”).

In Argentina, and throughout other parts of South America, the verb coger is used only as a derogatory term. Without going into too much detail, I had just told my colleague that I had experienced a sexual encounter with a bus!

This example, in particular, highlights just how drastically different Argentine Spanish, and indeed Latin American Spanish in general, can be from European Spanish.

I Learnt that Argentina’s Unique Vocabulary Is a Part of Life

As you’d expect, each Spanish-speaking country has its own unique set of national and regional vocabulary and colloquialisms. Argentina is no exception to this rule.

I’ve had the privilege of visiting many Spanish-speaking countries, but I am yet to find one in which local slang dominates the lexicon to an extent as great as in Argentina.

Learning new words became a daily challenge. I knew that to stand any chance of fitting in and to avoid sticking out like a sore thumb, I would need to learn vocabulary local not solely to Argentina as a whole, but also to the Greater Buenos Aires area.

It became apparent to me that Argentina’s unique vocabulary is a part of life. The most basic of tasks, such as purchasing fruit or juice at a local kiosk, requires knowledge of Argentina’s unique names for these items, none of which I knew existed!

Look at the Argentine Spanish words below, which bear no resemblance to their European Spanish counterparts!

ENGESPARGstrawberryfresafrutillajuicezumojugobananaplátanobananaavocadoaguacatepalta

I even struggled (very briefly) to purchase a phone at the local shop, unaware that the word móvil is nonexistent in Argentina in this context, replaced instead by celular.

These are just a few examples, but the list of words unique to Argentina or South America which differ to European Spanish is, quite literally, endless.

Below are others I encountered during the early stages of my time in Buenos Aires:

ENGESPARGcarcocheautopenbolígrafobirometo driveconducirmanejarbusautobúscolectivo/colet-shirtcamisetaremeraThe Intonation of Argentine Spanish Taught Me the History of Argentina’s Cultural Heritage

Not long after arriving in Argentina, I noticed that the intonation of Argentine Spanish resembles that of Italian far more than that of Spanish of any other Spanish-speaking country.

To me, it was fascinating to listen to an accent and sound that I had never encountered before. Listening to Argentine, and indeed Uruguayan Spanish, is like listening to a song. The intonation flutters upwards and downwards, in contrast to Spain’s much more monotonous intonation.

Understanding the main reasons for this intonation enables us also to understand a great deal about Argentina’s history.

Argentine Spanish is often referred to as Rioplatense Spanish, a dialect from the Rio de la Plata region, which resides between Argentina and Uruguay.

Although this region was conquered by Spain, it later received an influx of migration from Italy. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, almost half a million Italians (which accounted for more than half of all migrants) arrived in Argentina in search of work.

As a result of this period, more than 70% of Argentinians today are of Italian descent. It’s not surprising, then, that Argentine Spanish is often described as a combination of Spanish and Italian.

Whilst I did not adopt this accent during my time in Argentina, it certainly stuck with me and I thoroughly enjoy listening to it through film, radio or when conversing with friends.

Spanish School in Buenos Aires: Is Learning Spanish This Way Necessary?

There is no question that learning Spanish in a language school brings multiple benefits, particularly when you’re spending time abroad.

My friends in Europe had opted to spend their year abroad at a partner university in Spain, and many of the Western friends I made in Buenos Aires were studying Spanish at the local Spanish school in San Telmo, opting for daily classes each morning to progress from beginner level.

I am definitely not opposed to this style of learning. In fact, I’m actually a strong advocate of it. After all, I opted for the same method when I learnt French more recently whilst living in Paris, and I would love to learn Japanese or Chinese this way too.

Learning a language in a school brings benefits beyond (sometimes) quality teaching and thorough grammar explanations.

For a start, it’s a great way to meet new people. Moving abroad can be a daunting experience; language schools enable you to immerse yourself in the country of the target language a little more gently, meet like-minded individuals and create a social bubble.

However, I don’t believe it is necessary to learn Spanish in this traditional way, particularly if you already have some knowledge of the language.

Why It Is No Longer Necessary to Learn Spanish in This Traditional Way — And What to Do Instead

Allow me to explain. When it comes to learning languages abroad, there are obvious benefits to learning in a language school (as mentioned above).

However, moving abroad provides other opportunities. Depending on your professional goals, it is worth searching for work experience in order to immerse yourself fully on a daily basis, gaining valuable skill sets in the process.

Of course, this option is not for everybody, but working whilst on a period of residence abroad provides you with work experience, demonstrates to future employers that you have worked in an international environment and highlights your ability to speak a foreign language in a professional context.

There is, of course, a great difference between being able to ‘get by’ in a language and use it in a professional context.

During my stay in Argentina, I worked for a multinational company, albeit in a very junior position. Doing so enabled me to develop an understanding of work-life in the region and, more importantly, to obtain a high level of fluency in business Spanish.

This option is only feasible if you already have a relatively high level in the target language upon arrival. If you do, I would argue that this is more valuable than the experience a school can provide.

How I Used Free Time to Develop My Spanish

When spending time in Spain or South America, there are a number of ways to develop your Spanish, even when you are not working or studying.

During my time in Argentina, I was able to do so a great deal by taking full advantage of the country’s most valued pastimes.

This included:

visiting Argentina’s world famous food outlets – including the Argentine parrilla,joining a local football team (which is more within the realms of my physical capability than tango),and visiting various wonderful parts of the country outside of Buenos Aires.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, all of these social situations exposed me to new vocabulary, regional dialects and colloquialisms, none of which would have been achieved via a more academic route.

My Linguistic Progression in Spanish After 6 Months in Argentina: I Reached Fluency

Apparent to me upon my return home after my year in Argentina was the unquestionable progression I had made in Spanish. I had gone from being able to converse about a wide range of topics with relative fluency, to being totally fluent, or as fluent as I could have been under the circumstances.

It is said that once you can understand Argentinian Spanish, you can understand almost any Spanish. That said, anybody who has visited Cuba may disagree!

Certainly, after spending most of the year in Buenos Aires, I found Castilian Spanish much easier to understand upon return. I no longer required Spanish subtitles with films, and rarely needed to look up vocabulary in Spanish news articles. Everything had become easier to understand.

As I have iterated throughout this post, I put this progression down to cultural immersion, and the linguistic immersion that results from it. I do not believe that spending my period of residence abroad in a university would have brought me the same results and I am forever grateful for the work and social experiences I gained in Buenos Aires.

Today, I use fluency in Spanish in my everyday life, both professionally and socially. I have been able to travel to many countries in a role that I was only able to obtain due to my ability to speak a foreign language, and made friends from all over the world along the way.

Whilst there are many ways to learn a language, there are few which provide true cultural and linguistic immersion. For this reason, once you have developed some knowledge of Spanish, I cannot recommend moving to a Spanish-speaking country enough.

The post Learning Spanish in Argentina Was Key to My Fluency – Here’s Why appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

“Thank You” in Japanese: How to Express Your Gratitude in Japanese

Arigato! You’ve probably heard that phrase before, and know the domo arigato meaning from “Mr. Roboto”... But do you know all the ways to say “thank you” in Japanese?

Japanese, like English, has different variations of “thank you”, like “thanks” and “thank you so much.”

But there are also different ways to say thank you depending on the situation and the formality needed.

And sometimes, “excuse me” or “I’m sorry” is said instead!

So, let’s learn how to say “thank you” in Japanese so you can properly express your gratitude.

Table of contentsHow to Say Thank You in JapaneseSaying Thanks with Sumimasen instead of ArigatouThank You Very Much in JapaneseThanks in JapaneseThank You for the Food in JapaneseThanking Someone for Doing Something for You in JapaneseYou’re Welcome in JapaneseOther Japanese Words for “Thanks” and “Gratitude”Go Ahead, Thank Mr. Roboto!How to Say Thank You in Japanese

So… how do you say thank you in Japanese? Well, the most common and standard way to say it is ありがとう (arigatou).

Yes, romanized, it should actually be arigatou with a u instead of arigato, because in Japanese it has a long “oo” sound at the end.

This is a bit on the casual side, though, one that’s better used with your peers. If you want to be more formal, such as thanking a stranger or clerk at a store, you should use the more formal ありがとうございます (arigatou gozaimasu).

Also, if what you’re saying “thank you” for has already happened, you can change it to past tense: ありがとうございました (arigatou gozaimashita).

Saying Thanks with Sumimasen instead of Arigatou

In some cases, it’s more common to use the Japanese phrase すみません (sumimasen), which means “I’m sorry” or “excuse me”.

But when we use it in place of arigatou, you’re actually saying “I’m sorry to have troubled you” (whether you asked for the favor or not).

In Japan, it’s super important to acknowledge someone’s effort or inconvenience on someone else’s behalf. That’s why phrases like お邪魔します (ojama shimasu) and お疲れ様でした (otsukaresama deshita) are everyday phrases.

The first in English means “thanks for having me over” but it translates as “I’m sorry for intruding.” And otsukaresama deshita means “thanks for your hard work” in English, but translates as “you must be tired (from all your hard work)”.

Both phrases, when translated to English, mean “thanks”. But in Japanese, they acknowledge someone’s effort or inconvenience on your behalf.

すみません (sumimasen) is the same way. When someone has done something for you that’s taken up their time, effort, money, or energy, then you can reply with すみません (sumimasen). It’s often used when receiving gifts, for example.

Thank You Very Much in Japanese

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto...

Domo arigato (or in proper romanization, doumo arigatou, with long “oo” sounds) means “thank you very much”. どうもありがとう (doumo arigatou) is more formal than arigatou by itself. But it’s still appropriate to say with friends and family, especially if they did a huge favor for you.

It’s more common to use this phrase in its more formal form: どうもありがとうございます (doumo arigatou gozaimasu).

どうも (doumo) translates as “thanks” because that’s the main use for the word, but it’s an emphasizing word like “very”. So you use this to emphasize how thankful you are.

Basically, you can play around with how you use どうも (doumo), ありがとう (arigatou), and ございます/ました (gozaimasu/mashita) to change up your level of thanks and formality.

You could say どうも (doumo).

Or どうもありがとう (doumo arigatou).

Or ありがとう (arigatou).

Or ありがとうございます (arigatou gozaimasu).

Or どうもありがとうございました (doumo arigatou gozaimashita).

You get the point. There’s plenty of ways to say thank you in Japanese!

There’s one other phrase to mention here: 恐れ入ります (osoreirimasu). This is an extremely formal phrase, and one that’s on the apologetic side like すみません (sumimasen).

You won’t use this phrase often, but you’ll hear it said to you. 恐れ入ります (osoreirimasu) is often used by shop clerks or workers to their customers to thank them.

Thanks in Japanese

“Thanks” in Japanese can be a simple どうも (doumo) or ありがとう (arigatou). Both are casual ways to say “thanks”.

But there are a few slang ways to say it, too. One common way to say “thanks” is サンキュー (sankyuu), which is taken straight from English.

Another slang way to say thanks is あざっす (azassu). Sometimes this is shortened even more in text, where it becomes AZS (yes, in English characters), ありー (ari-) or あーと (a-to). They’re all short forms of the full phrase ありがとうございます (arigatou gozaimasu).

Thank You for the Food in Japanese

There are two cultural phrases in Japanese that have no direct translation in English, but more or less mean “thank you for this food”. They are:

いただきます (itadakimasu)ごうちそうさまでした (gouchisousama deshita)

The first, いただきます (itadakimasu) is said before you start eating. It’s like a cross between the French bon appetit and saying grace before you eat: “thank you for this food, amen.”

Itadakimasu lets everyone know it’s time to start eating, while also expressing thanks for having food to eat and those who are sharing it with you.

ごうちそうさまでした (gouchisousama deshita) is said after the meal. It means “thank you for this food” as well. You’ll say to express gratitude not only for the food, but also to everyone who enjoyed it with you, the chef who cooked it, and if someone else paid for it.

Thanking Someone for Doing Something for You in Japanese

There’s actually a specific grammar pattern you use when you want to thank someone specifically for doing something for you.

It’s ~てくれてありがとう (~te kurete arigatou).

First, you’ll need to know how to conjugate into Japanese te-form for this one, so brush up on that if you need to.

You’ll change the verb form to te-form, the Japanese version of English -ing ending. Then you’ll add くれて (kurete) and whatever form of thank you that’s appropriate for the situation as discussed above.

くれる (kureru) is the verb meaning “to receive (from someone else)”. We use this verb when someone else has done us a favor.

Here’s an example:

この本を貸してくれてありがとう！とっても面白かった。 Kono hon wo kashite kurete arigatou! Tottemo omoshirokatta. “Thanks for lending me this book! It was really interesting.”

You’re Welcome in Japanese

“You’re welcome” in Japanese is どういたしまして (dou itashimashite). But this is a formal way to say “you’re welcome.”

There’s actually many ways to say “you’re welcome” in Japanese, too.

For instance, in casual situations, you could say…

ううん (uun): “No” (casual)全然 (zenzen): “Not at all”問題もない (mondai mo nai): “No problem”いいえいいえ (iie iie): “No” (more formal)別に (betsu ni): “Nothing” or “No problem”うん、いいよ (un, ii yo): “Yup, it’s fine”大丈夫 (daijoubu): “It’s alright”いやいやいや (iya iya iya): “No no no…” (casual, used in a denial way)もちろん (mochiron): “Of course”

And these are often used in various combinations, too. Like:

ううん、問題もないよ。(uun, mondai mo nai yo): “Nah, it was no problem.”うん、別にいいよ。(un, betsu ni ii yo): “Yeah, it’s nothing (don’t worry about it).”全然問題もない。(zenzen mondai mo nai): “No problem at all!”いやいやいや、別に。(iya iya iya, betsu ni): “No, no no, it was nothing/no big deal.”うん、もちろん大丈夫ね。(un, mochiron daijoubu ne): “Yeah, of course, it’s fine!”

There are a couple of other formal phrases for “you’re welcome” too that are especially common in the workplace. Such as:

こちらこそ (kochirakoso): This means “likewise” but in reply to thank you, it means something like “I should also be thanking you” or “thank you as well”.遠慮しないでください (enryo shinaide kudasai): “Don’t hesitate (to ask for help)”. You can also shorten this to 遠慮しないで (enryo shinaide) when speaking to a peer.Other Japanese Words for “Thanks” and “Gratitude”

We’re almost there! There are just a few more handy phrases you need to know to express your gratitude and say “thanks” in Japanese.

The word for “gratitude” in Japanese is 感謝 (kansha), and it can be turned into a verb by attaching する (suru, “to do”). So it becomes 感謝する (kansha suru), meaning “to be grateful” or “to be thankful”.

You’ll use this verb a lot when you want to express your thanks as a verb, like:

美味しい夕食に感謝します。 Oishii yuushoku ni kansha shimasu. “Thank you for a delicious dinner.” or “I’m thankful for the delicious dinner.”

You can also use ありがたい (arigatai) to mean "thankfully" as an adjective.

天気が良かったのでありがたいです。 Tenki ga yokatta node arigatai desu. “I’m thankful for the good weather.”

There's also the phrase お陰様で (okagesama de) which is used quite often in everyday life. It’s a bit formal, but it means “thanks to you.”

This is often said to say thank you for something going well or as a reply to a compliment in which the other person helped you earn.

For example, let’s say your friend helped you prepare for an upcoming exam. Once you took the exam, you did really well and you showed your friend. That exchange might look like:

友達: うわー！試験で本当にうまくいった！ Tomodachi: Uwa-! Shiken de hontouni umaku itta! 私: お陰様で！ Watashi: Okagesama de!

Friend: “Wow! You did really well on your exam!” Me: “All thanks to you!”

You’ll notice in this example, we used 本当に (hontou ni). This means “really” and it’s often used to express sincere thanks with ありがとう (arigatou), like 本当にありがとうございます (hontou ni arigatou gozaimasu). “Really, thank you so much!”

You can use 誠に (makoto ni, “sincerely”) in the same way, too, although this makes it more formal.

Go Ahead, Thank Mr. Roboto!

Well, the Styx may have warmed you up for this lesson, but there was still so much to learn. But now, you’re a pro at expressing your gratitude.

Don’t forget to learn more 挨拶 (aisatsu, “greetings”) and essential Japanese phrases next. You could also master how to say “I’m sorry” in Japanese, too.

Go start thanking everyone you know in Japanese!

The post “Thank You” in Japanese: How to Express Your Gratitude in Japanese appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

The Best Way to Learn a Language [Scientifically Proven and Polyglot Tested]

"What's the best way to learn a language?"

"What's the quickest way to learn new words?"

"How can I sound like a native speaker?"

"Do I really have to study grammar?"

Language hackers ask themselves these kinds of questions all the time.

We all want to use effective study methods so we can learn a language fast and speak it well.

But many language teachers and programs are giving conflicting advice. How can we know if we're spending our time on the right things?

Fortunately, language learners aren't the only ones who've been puzzling over these questions.

Linguists, the people who study the science of language, have spent decades observing how people learn languages. And while they don't have all the answers yet, they have discovered a lot about what works and what doesn't.

So let's take a look at some of the most common questions in language learning and what science has to say about them. We'll also look at the scientifically proven best way to learn a language so we can become better language learners.

We’ll be covering:

The fastest way to learn new words in another language The best way to learn a language by yourself or online The best language learning apps and resources The science of flashcards How to learn words the natural way Do you really need to study grammar? The best way to stay motivated to learn a language How to find a friend to study with and set mini-goals FAQs about pronunciation, accents, and more

What's the Fastest Way to Learn New Words in Another Language?

Related Learning: 5 Rituals to Help You Learn a Language Faster

There are as many ways to learn vocabulary as there are successful language learners.

The most important debate - as far as science is concerned - is often about which approach is best. Should we memorise words using flashcards? Or should we pick them up naturally through reading and listening?

In reality, they're both a bit right. Both techniques are useful for different reasons and if you can balance the two, you'll be onto a winner.

Here at Fluent in 3 Months, the tried-and-true method is speaking from day one to help you use and remember what you learn. Here’s a video about how to practice this approach:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mM---...

You can also check out our articles about the best ways to learn a language faster in Spanish, Japanese, German, English French, Korean, and even Latin.

The Best Way to Learn a Language By Yourself or Online

Related Learning: 16 Ways to Immerse Yourself at Home

So what’s the best way to learn a language online or if you’re studying by yourself? We can’t all get up and go travel abroad until we become fluent.

Well, one way to do that is through home immersion.

It’s possible to create an immersive environment at home. It just takes a bit of effort and patience.

For example, you can use social media to immerse yourself at home. You can also use social media to find communities to chat with.

Switching your phone’s language or watching shows in your target language will help you achieve an immersive experience, too. And of course, you’ll want as much speaking and writing practice as possible.

Here’s a short video with more details about this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7yqGC... Language Learning Apps to Learn a Language Fast

Related Learning: Our Recommended Resources

If you’re learning a language by yourself at home, you’ll want to use the best language learning apps to get you going.

But there are so many of them... So how do you know which to use?

Well, it depends on the language you're learning, your goals, and your preferred learning style.

That’s why the Fluent in 3 Months team review tons of language apps and resources, like:

BabbleSpanishPod101DuoLingoLingQAnkiMondlyJapanese UncoveredStaircase Method90 Day KoreanLearning with Virtual Reality

...And so many more.

When deciding on the best language learning apps to use, pick only 1 - 3 to begin with. If you use too many at once, it’ll become repetitive and distracting.

It’s a good idea to have a vocab app you like and at least one app that teaches you the language structure. After that, you could pick one that gives you practice in the way you learn best.

So for example, if you prefer listening, try Pod101 language podcasts. If you prefer reading, try LingQ.

You use something untraditional, too, like learning through Netflix or Nintendo. Here’s a video about how to do that:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rxnj... Science of Flashcards

Related Learning: How to Use a Memory Palace to Boost Your Vocabulary

Lots of learners use flashcard systems.

These days, most people use apps like Anki which leave a specific time-lapse between card reviews using a system called spaced repetition.

This technique is based on research by German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus. His research showed that people learn more when they space learning out rather than cramming it in.

This means that you'll remember a word much better if you look at it once a day for five days, rather than five times in the same day.

Ebbinghaus also noticed that people tend to remember things better when they can link them to personal experiences. You can take advantage of this by using a memory technique called mnemonics. This technique involves linking words in the language you're learning to words and images in your own language that sound similar.

For example, to remember the Mandarin Chinese word for book, shu, you could imagine a book with a shoe on it. That helps you link the image of a book to its Chinese translation.

Using these techniques can help you balance learning new things and reviewing, as talked about in this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URzYi...

Spaced repetition and mnemonics can boost your word power quickly and make your brain feel like an awesome vocabulary learning machine. But they're not the be-all and end-all of memory strategies.

In fact, overuse of these techniques can actually harm your vocabulary, and here's why.

Your N400 Signal: How to Learn Words the Natural Way

Related Learning: Contextese - The Most Useful Language You’re Already Fluent In

You may not know it, but your brain is already an awesome vocabulary learning machine. And there’s a scientifically proven best way to learn a language: it’s through context.

When you read or listen to something, your brain doesn't take each word at face value. Instead, it's taking statistics about which words appear together often so that it can anticipate what's coming next and process speech faster.

Neuroscientists have found a way to measure when your brain is doing this. Our brains emit electrical signals, which change depending on what task your brain is dealing with.

Scientists can read some of these, using a technique called electroencephalography, to study how your brain processes language (but don't worry, they can't read your mind... yet!).

One of these signals, called N400, changes depending on whether words make sense in context or not. The N400 is relatively small for expected word combinations, like coffee and cream. It increases in height for unexpected word combinations, like coffee and crap.

This means that scientists can read the N400 height to analyse the kind of expectations you have about which words usually occur together. If your N400 doesn't increase for coffee and crap, they might wonder how on earth you've been drinking your coffee.

In language learners, the N400 changes based on proficiency. The better people get at a language, the closer their N400 pattern is to a native speaker's.

So, an important part of fluency is taking statistics and building expectations about what words usually appear together, like native speakers do.

To get better at this, we need to flood our brains with bucket loads of natural content. So we can build a picture of which kinds of words usually appear together.

Reading is a great way to do this. And there's lots of research that shows that reading works wonders for your vocabulary skills.

Choose resources that are right for your level, though. If the percentage of unknown words is too high, it can be difficult to figure out what they mean from the context. And it's frustrating having to stop every two minutes to look up a word.

Graded readers, which adapt books to make them easier to understand at lower levels, are perfect for this.

Do You Really Need to Study Grammar?

Related Learning: Learning Grammar… Do I Have To?

Grammarphobes often ask themselves whether it's necessary to learn all those grammar rules. Can't we pick it up with the natural method, that is, through reading, listening and talking?

Linguists struggle to answer this question because it's very difficult to control and measure.

Experiments usually compare one group who learn grammar rules with another who learns the natural way.

But how do we know each group has paid attention to the same grammar structure the same number of times? What if the ones who aren't taught the rules are secretly trying to figure out the rules in their heads, or running off home and learning it on their own? How do you know if they've learned the grammar?

That's why, after decades of research, the grammar question is still a very murky one. To clear it up, linguists have started gathering all available research on learning grammar rules and seeing if there's a pattern.

The results emerging show that grammar rules do help people speak more accurately. But the results aren't nearly as drastic as you might think, especially given the attention to grammar in the majority of language classes and textbooks.

These results fit in with my experience as a language learner. Knowing the grammar does help, but spending the majority of my time memorising complicated grammar rules isn’t the most effective way to learn.

Here’s Fluent in 3 Months founder Benny Lewis’s thoughts on this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtQhh... the Best Way to Stay Motivated in Language Learning?

Related Learning: Why Language Learnings Quit -- and How to Beat the “Motivational Killers”

This is probably the most important question of all. You can know all the best ways to learn pronunciation, words, and grammar. But if you can't maintain your motivation, it's never going to happen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1LZu...

Luckily there's loads of cool research on motivation that'll help you get your language learning act together. Here are a couple of ways to get started:

Find a Friend or Language Partner to Study With

Studies show that people who feel like they're working as a team (even if they're not physically together) accomplish more. There are a few reasons for this:

Social: We're social animals and sharing our experiences with others makes us feel more positive about them.Accountability: Once your goals are out there for all to see, you're more likely to work towards them.Support: You get access to a lovely support network who can give you advice and encouragement.

One of the best ways to do this is by finding a language exchange partner or community of like-minded learners who can support you. The Fluent in 3 Months Challenge is one such community with amazing support groups, language exchanges, and challenges to push you to the next level.

Break Down Your Big Goals into Mini-Missions

Research shows that people who break down big tasks into little chunks get more done in the long run.

In one study, people who were given six pages of maths problems per session over seven sessions. They completed the pages faster and more accurately than people who were given all 42 pages from the start.

Breaking down the task is essential in something like language learning, where the outcome feels big and scary.

Instead of trying to "speak German", aim for something smaller and more concrete, like having a 15-minute conversation in German. Come up with a plan to get there, like studying 30 minutes a day with your apps and resources you picked out (as we talked about earlier!).

By breaking it down this way, you're much more likely to do it. And if you keep it up day by day, you'll be speaking a language before you know it.

Frequently Asked Language Learning Questions

Phew! That was a lot to cover, but now you know what you need to find your own best way to learn a language.

But you may still have some questions about language learning. Like how to sound more like a native speaker and correcting pronunciation.

So here are a few more in-depth answers for your curious linguistic minds:

How Can You Sound More Like a Native Speaker?

Perhaps the first question to address is why you want to sound more like a native speaker. Lots of language learners don't worry much about pronunciation. They think that as long as people can get what they're saying, that's all that matters. And there's some truth in this: you don't need a perfect accent to communicate well with native speakers. But the more you sound like a native speaker, the easier it is for them to understand you. And the easier it is for people to understand you, the more they enjoy talking to you. This comes in handy, given that you need to talk to people to learn their language.

Here are some articles to help you with this:

How to Improve Your Spanish Pronunciation
Benny’s French Pronunciation Guide
German Pronunciation Guide
Learn Better Pronunciation While Speaking Your Native Language

But why do we have accents in the first place? And what can we do about them?

Why Do We Have Foreign Accents?

There are two main reasons language learners have foreign accents. First, it can be difficult to tell the difference between two sounds that don't exist in our native language. Second, other languages can have sounds that make us use our mouth muscles in a new way. Essentially, we need to learn how to train our mouth muscles to form these new sounds. And train our ears to hear the sounds that don’t exist in our native language.

Sound Differences That Don't Exist in Our Own Language

When I started learning Italian, I spent a few months desperately trying to avoid the word anno (“year”), for fear of accidentally saying the word ano (“ass”). I couldn't hear the difference at all. On the flip side, I'm a native English speaker, so the difference between the “sheep” and “ship” vowels seems obvious. But lots of learners struggle with the difference, which explains why everyone's terrified of speaking English on holiday, with all those beaches and sheets and what not. This happens because when we're born, we have super little polyglot brains. They can tell the difference between sounds in any language. As we grow older, our brain focuses on sounds that are important for our native language and filters out sounds that are not. This is good, as it helps us understand our own language better. But it causes problems for language learners because they filter out sounds that might be in the language they're learning. But it’s important to note that this does not mean that there’s such as thing as being “too old to learn a language”. It just means that we need to focus our attention on this area of our learning.

How to Tell Sounds Apart

Linguists have been studying this phenomenon for years. And they've found a way to help learners hear and pronounce the difference between these tricky sounds. This method, known as minimal pair training, involves listening to a word that has the sound difference you want to learn (like ship or sheep), deciding which one you think it is, and getting immediate feedback about whether you were right or wrong. After a few sessions, you'll hear the difference more easily and be able to pronounce them better. You set up your own minimal pair training by using forvo to download sound files of the words you want to learn to tell apart. Then use Anki to put the sound file on the question side and the written word on the other. Listen to the word, try to guess which one it is, then flip the flashcard over to see if you were right.

How to Train Your Mouth Muscles for Correct Pronunciation

Some sounds are difficult because they involve completely new mouth positions, like the rolled "R" in Spanish or the "U" in French. For these sounds, science has some good news. It turns out that with a little perseverance, it's absolutely possible to train your mouth muscles to pronounce sounds more like native speakers. To do this, you need to learn a little about articulatory phonetics (which is a fancy-pants way of saying mouth positions). This helps us find out exactly where the tongue, teeth and lips should be in the sounds you want to learn. Then practice them until your mouth naturally moves to that position. “That sounds great, but where do I learn about all these mouth positions?”, I hear you ask. Well, luckily a smart guy called Idahosa Ness is already teaching people about the mouth positions in lots of different languages, with his Mimic Method courses, available for English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin and Portuguese. You can also check out his YouTube videos on the subject. Or try doing a quick search on YouTube. There are tons of pronunciation videos which explain the mouth positions in the language you're learning. A good example is Glossika Phonics.

The Best Way to Learn a Language: Play Around With It!

Okay, okay. That was a lot to take in. But here’s the main idea: the best way to learn a language on your own is going to depend on you. And to find your best way to learn, you’ll have to play around a bit.

So take the scientific reasoning and the tips here as evidence of what may be best for you, and run with it. Make it your own!

How do you best learn a language? Leave a comment and let us know.

Original article by Katie Harris, updated by the Fluent in 3 Months team.

The post The Best Way to Learn a Language [Scientifically Proven and Polyglot Tested] appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

How to Use Possessive Adjectives in Spanish

Possessive adjectives in Spanish are words like “my” (mi) and “his” (suya). They show that an object belongs to somebody.

Possessive adjectives work a little differently in Spanish compared to English. I’ve put together this guide so you can understand exactly how they work.

In this complete guide to mastering Spanish possessive adjectives, you’ll learn:

Table of contentsSpanish Possessive Adjectives: What Are They?How Many Possessive Adjectives Are There in Spanish?Short-Form Possessive Adjectives in SpanishLong-Form Possessive Adjectives in SpanishBesides Spanish Possessive Adjectives: Other Ways to Indicate Possession in SpanishHow to Learn the Possessive Adjectives in Spanish: Practice! (Plus a Free Spanish Adjectives Worksheet)Some Example Spanish Sentences With Possessive AdjectivesYou’re On Your Way to Mastering All the Possessive Adjectives in Spanish

There is a lot to learn, so let’s get started!

Spanish Possessive Adjectives: What Are They?

What are possessive adjectives in Spanish?

An adjective is a word that describes a noun. Words like rojo (“red”) and delgado (“thin”) are adjectives.

As I mentioned earlier, the role of a possessive adjective in Spanish is to describe ownership. Possessive adjectives specify who or what owns or possesses something.

Here are some examples:

Traje mi libro - “I brought my book.”La hermana suya no vino - “His sister didn’t come.”

There are two types of possessive adjectives in Spanish: short-form and long-form. Short-form possessive adjectives go before the noun they describe. Long-form possessive adjectives go after the noun.

I’ll explain more about each type in a moment.

How Many Possessive Adjectives Are There in Spanish?

There are only eight possessive adjectives in Spanish.

Sounds strange? In the chart above it might look like there are more, but if you look closely, you’ll notice that su/s and suyo/a/os/as appear twice. What’s more, nuestro/a/os/as and vuestro/a/os/as count both as short-form and long-form possessive adjectives.

Not only that, but once you learn the stems, you only need to apply the standard gender and number changes when they’re needed.

“Stems?” You might think. “Benny, you’ve lost me!” Let me take a step back a moment. By stems, I mean the masculine singular possessive adjectives because they are the simplest form.

So yes, you only have eight possessive adjectives to learn in Spanish!

Short-Form Possessive Adjectives in Spanish

Here is the first important bit of information: short-form possessive adjectives in Spanish are the shortest Spanish possessive adjectives. They’re also the most common, so you might have already come across them and perhaps even used them.

In Spanish, they are known as adjetivos posesivos átonos (“atonic possessive adjectives”) or adjetivos posesivos débiles (“weak possessive adjectives”). In English, we also call them “unstressed possessive adjectives”.

Here’s a simple chart to learn short-form Spanish possessive adjectives:

Singular Plural Masculine Feminine Masculine Feminine my mi mi mis mis your (with tú and vos) tu tu tus tus his, her, your (with usted) su su sus sus our nuestro nuestra nuestros nuestras your (with vosotros and vosotras) vuestro vuestra vuestros vuestras their, your (with ustedes) su su sus sus

As you can see, short-form possessive adjectives follow the rule of agreement for adjectives in Spanish.

The first rule is about numbers. If the described noun is plural, so is the adjective. Look at mi and mis. Or su and sus.

Spanish has the same rule for adjectives with gender. However, with short-form possessive adjectives, the gender agreement only applies to nuestro/a/os/as and vuestro/a/os/as.

¡Ojo! (“Be careful!”) Spanish adjectives agree in gender and number with the word they describe. With possessive adjectives, this means that the adjective changes according to what is possessed, and not whoever or whatever possesses it.

Examples:

Dame tus cuadernos - “Give me your notebooks.” (“Your” agrees with “notebooks”.)Traje nuestra bicicleta - “I brought our bicycle.” (“Our” agrees with “bicycle”.)Marta vio vuestros primos - “Marta saw your cousins.” (“Your” agrees with “cousins”.)Long-Form Possessive Adjectives in Spanish

If you’ve already studied Spanish for some time, you might have come across sentences using long-form possessive adjectives.

In Spanish, they’re known as adjetivos posesivos tónicos (“tonic possessive adjectives”) or adjetivos posesivos fuertes (“strong possessive adjectives”). They aren’t as popular as the short-form possessive adjectives. In English, we also call them “stressed possessive adjectives”.

Here’s a simple chart to learn Spanish long-form possessive adjectives:

Singular Plural masc. fem. masc. fem. of mine mío mía míos mías of yours (tú, vos) tuyo tuya tuyos tuyas of his/of hers/of yours (usted) suyo suya suyos suyas of ours nuestro nuestra nuestros nuestras of yours (vosotros/as) vuestro vuestra vuestros vuestras of theirs/of yours (ustedes) suyo suya suyos suyas

As you’ve learnt earlier in the post, long-form possessive adjectives in Spanish go after the noun they describe.

Examples:

Son primos nuestros. - “They’re cousins of ours.” Or “They’re our cousins.”La amiga suya está llegando - “The friend of hers is coming.” Or “Her friend is coming.”Es problema tuyo. - “It’s a problem of yours.” Or “It’s your problem.”

They are known as “stressed” because they shift the attention from the noun they describe to themselves. In other words, when stressed possessive adjectives are used in Spanish, what belongs isn’t important in the sentence. To whom it belongs to is highlighted, instead.

Besides Spanish Possessive Adjectives: Other Ways to Indicate Possession in Spanish

There are two other ways to indicate possession in Spanish: using the preposition de and using possessive pronouns.

The preposition de is the Spanish equivalent of the genitive Saxon, the English apostrophe “s”.

Example: La bicicleta de Marta. (“Marta’s bicycle.”)

Possessive pronouns in Spanish look exactly like long-form possessive adjectives. Take a look at this chart:

Possessive pronouns Long-form possessive adjectives Singular Plural Masculine Feminine Masculine Feminine mine mío mía míos mías of mine mío/a/as/os yours (with tú and vos) tuyo tuya tuyos tuyas of yours tuyo/a/os/as his, hers, yours (with usted) suyo suya suyos suyas of his/hers/yours suyo/a/os/as ours nuestro nuestra nuestros nuestras of ours nuestro/a/os/as yours (with vosotros and vosotras) vuestro vuestra vuestros vuestras of yours vuestro/a/os/as theirs, yours (with ustedes) suyo suya suyos suyas of theirs/yours suyo/a/os/as

So how can you tell the difference between the two?

First of all, they have different grammatical roles. Just as an adjective describes a word, a pronoun replaces a word or a phrase in a sentence. This word or phrase has usually already been mentioned or is implied.

And secondly, the possessive pronouns follow a definite article. “The” is the English definite article. In Spanish, “the” translates to el, la, los, las.

Examples:

Si olvidaste tu lápiz, usa el nuestro. - “If you forgot your pencil, use ours.”No entiendo cuál es la casa de Marta. La mía es la azul. - “I don't understand which is Marta’s house. Mine is the blue one.”How to Learn the Possessive Adjectives in Spanish: Practice! (Plus a Free Spanish Adjectives Worksheet)

Here’s the secret: when it comes to language learning, the only real magic is... practice. In all the years I spent working my way to fluency in over ten languages, I have never found the single best way to improve. As I often say, mistakes make the best masters.

Here’s how to learn possessive adjectives in Spanish:

Create a list of possessive adjectives in Spanish. Practice by building sentences that include possessive adjectives, both short-form and long-form.

After a bit of time, you’ll be confident in your ability to choose the right adjectives and correctly spell them. This is when you should start practicing out loud.

To do this, I recommend practicing with native speakers. The best place to find someone to have a conversation is italki.

You can also quiz yourself or use this worksheet about possessive adjectives in Spanish to improve your skills.

Some Example Spanish Sentences With Possessive Adjectives

Here are some Spanish sentences with possessive adjectives:

Me gusta mi vecindario. → short-form - “I like my neighborhood.”El libro mío está dañado. → long-form - “My book is damaged.”Aquí están tus amigas. → short-form - “Here are your friends.”Las manzanas tuyas son muy buenas.→ long-form - “Your apples are very good.”Señor Pablo, su almuerzo está listo. → short-form - “Mr. Pablo, your lunch is ready.”Los hijos suyos estudian muy bien. → long-form - “Your children study very well.”Amelia no sabe si sus padres vendrán.” → short-form - “Amelia doesn’t know if her parents will come.”Rompí nuestra bicicleta. → short-form - “I broke our bicycle.”El coche nuestro es azul. → long-form - “Our car is blue.” Nuestros primos no se fueron. → short-form - “Our cousins didn’t go.” Vuestras camisas están manchadas. → short-form - “Your shirts are stained.”El cuaderno vuestro lo tiene Marcos. → long-form - “Marcos has your notebook.” Sus perros son muy tiernos. → short-form - “Their dogs are really cute.”You’re On Your Way to Mastering All the Possessive Adjectives in Spanish

That’s all you need to know to master possessive adjectives in Spanish.

For more help with speaking Spanish, you can learn about Spanish reflexive verbs. I also recommend learning the 101 core Spanish words.

If you’d like to learn how to speak Spanish quickly, then check out the Fluent in 3 Months Challenge, where you’ll have a 15-minute conversation in Spanish after just 90 days of learning.

¡Nos vemos en otra aventura! (“See you on another adventure!”)

The post How to Use Possessive Adjectives in Spanish appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

How Using Transcriptions Can Improve Your Listening Skills

If you’re a language learner, you know how important it is to have good listening skills.

In a conversation, many factors can affect each speaker's understanding and response. It might be the tone, timing, or facial expressions and hand gestures. Whatever the factor, listening is still the best way to perceive the other end's message.

While listening comprehension is the most challenging part of language acquisition, it's vital to focus on and improve it. Without it, it's hard to understand a message, respond, or feel something.

But aside from being all ears, you can rely on other ways, like transcription, to help improve your listening skills in a simple and interesting way.

Here’s how:

Table of contentsAdvantages of Transcribing: How It Can Help Improve Your Listening SkillsIt Helps You Retain Words and Message BetterIt Facilitates Your Understanding of Sentence StructuresIt Helps Keeping a High AccuracyIt Allows You to Save TimeIt’s an Enjoyable Way to Learn LanguagesThe Transcribing Techniques that Can Help You Improve Your Listening SkillsManual TranscriptionAutomatic Transcription

function runSplitTest(){var randomNumber = Math.floor(Math.random() * 2) + 1console.log(randomNumber)var copy = "";if (randomNumber == 1){ copy = '<i>One thing before we get started: you can chat away in a new language for at least 15 minutes with the "Fluent in 3 Months" method. All it takes is 90 days. <a href="https://www.fluentin3months.com/other... this link to find out more.</a></i>'} else { copy = '<i>One thing before we get started: you can chat away with a native speaker for at least 15 minutes with my "Fluent in 3 Months" method. All it takes is 90 days. <a href="https://www.fluentin3months.com/other... this link to find out more.</a></i>'}var copyToChange = document.querySelector("p.copyText").innerHTML = copy;}runSplitTest();Advantages of Transcribing: How It Can Help Improve Your Listening Skills

Aside from recording and reference purposes, transcribing is also an effective technique to use for listening exercises.

Transcribing has many benefits and advantages, such as:

It Helps You Retain Words and Message Better

During listening practices, having a quality audio source and notes for reference is an ideal setup.

First, clear and unedited audio helps present the most accurate representation of a speaker's message, tone, and intent. By using clear audio, a listener can easily hear and understand every word, part, pauses, and even voice level of the speaker.

While careful listening helps in remembering words and messages, having notes for reference is more beneficial. Since most individuals prefer or can study better with visual guidance (images, illustrations, or symbols), transcription can help listeners remember words.

As for messages, live transcription is an excellent way to understand the speaker's tone and intent.

If you're unfamiliar with the term, live transcription is when the text can sync to the audio file as per the timing of the recording. In other words, live transcription's pauses and responsive pacing features are great identifiers of a person's emotions, seriousness, intention, and urgency.

It Facilitates Your Understanding of Sentence Structures

Similar to writing, spoken communication is highly effective when sentences are in their proper structures.

Yes, speaking can be straightforward. However, there are many cases when sentence formation can significantly affect the message. Misinterpretation of a sentence can ruin important meetings, agreements, or any other serious conversation.

Whatever it may be, it’s necessary to consider every detail and avoid confusion.

By using transcription, a listener can see the sentences laid out accordingly. As a result, it can be much easier to understand someone's message based on the placement of words, use of punctuations, and other things.

In listening exercises, reading transcriptions simultaneously to listening to the audio can help train speed and correctness in understanding a speaker's words.

As such, by familiarizing yourself with every sentence structure and analyzing real-world examples (like transcriptions), it's only a matter of time before your listening comprehension improves.

It Helps Keeping a High Accuracy

In businesses, academics, and government, accuracy is of utmost importance. With only a simple mistake, a message can change, a plan might fail, and an agreement might not pass. And making silly mistakes in a language you’re learning might feel just as terrible.

This is why organizations use every possible way to keep things accurate, including transcription.

In listening comprehension, correctness is everything. When someone is speaking, it’s almost imperative to recognize every word, sentence, and meaning. With integrity, you can preserve the message and intent of a speaker.

By using transcription, one can learn the right words and punctuations of a speech from an audio file.

Moreover, as audio formats can be distorted or contain corrupted sections, voices can sometimes be unclear, buzzy, or inaudible. In this case, transcription software can use AI to analyze tones that are unclear to human ears and convert them into readable text.

Lastly, listening to audio files while reading their transcriptions can help individuals get familiar with speech patterns, common speaking styles, and many more factors of language learning.

It Allows You to Save Time

It might be common knowledge, but transcription saves time for both recording and understanding purposes.

First, unlike listening to hundreds, maybe thousands of lines, transcribing tools can generate text from an audio file in a matter of seconds or minutes, depending on the content's length.

Besides, written or visual content is easier to grasp than verbal and other on-demand media.

Next, for language learners with only a little time to spare, transcription can help speed things up. Instead of repeating an audio's part because you haven’t understood a sound, you can copy and learn a word's definition quickly from a transcription. This way, lessons can be bite-sized given how easy the text is to divide into parts.

It’s an Enjoyable Way to Learn Languages

For many individuals, learning a new language can be challenging. With countless letters, symbols, pronunciations, and other obstacles, it's easy to get tired, overwhelmed, or even bored.

Transcribing can spice things up a little bit.

When listening to the audio file of a speech, conversation, or any other audio content, a reference at hand can help make learning fun. Why? Since you have a readable copy of the audio, you can worry less about failing to understand. Consequently, you can focus more on the message instead of furiously jotting down notes.

Unlike solely listening to a speaker, reading a transcription feels like viewing a script.

It can feel like you're directing someone or you're ahead of the curve since you already know what the speaker will say in the following minutes. In fact, according to a report by the University of California, spoilers, can, in many cases, make watching more fun and the spectator more focused.

Similarly, transcriptions help you understand the entirety of a speech, focus more on other essential tasks of listening, and appreciate the message more.

The Transcribing Techniques that Can Help You Improve Your Listening Skills

Due to its usefulness and specific requirements, many organizations and individuals have come up with numerous transcribing techniques, namely the following:

Manual Transcription

As the name suggests, manual transcription is entirely manual. Instead of using automated tools, a person will listen carefully to a speaker and jot down things.

Apart from writing down all words, there are different methods in manual transcribing:

Verbatim transcription:

Verbatim transcription is about converting every word into text.

Unlike other forms of transcription, verbatim takes more time when done manually. Also, when live transcribing, it's almost impossible to capture every word without missing anything. Consequently, it's less prevalent in more fast-paced settings.

However, it's advantageous for pointing out every little detail. It’s an excellent fit for information-sensitive events like meetings, agreements, and many more.

Intelligent transcription:

Intelligent transcription is a more concise version of verbatim transcription.

Unlike the former, intelligent transcription excludes unnecessary words or elements from the script. In other words, it forgeos things that add no meaning or value, or that lengthen the passage.

While it's suitable for conserving space and summarizing context, it's not advisable for learning languages. Since words can change and sentences might vary in length, learners can confuse meanings when listening to the original audio.

Edited transcription

Edited transcription is like an intersection of verbatim and intelligent transcription.

First, it cuts out most of the highly unnecessary elements, but still ensures the integrity of the message.

Next, it identifies and corrects grammatical issues and makes sentences clear and easy to understand.

Above all, it's more pleasant to read and digest than the previous two methods, given its balance of conciseness and completeness.

Phonetic transcription

Phonetic transcription is a method used significantly by professional transcribers and more prominent events, like hearings and assemblies.

Since it uses the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), it's much faster to type words and capture pronunciation.

However, this method requires a specialized input device or 3rd party software keyboard to work. Also, one must have fast cognition skills, typing speed, and multitasking capabilities when transcribing.

Automatic Transcription

Since it takes time to transcribe manually and not everyone can remember the entire IPA, automatic transcribing tools have become mainstream.

Transcription software can convert audio into text in a matter of seconds, as opposed to the considerably longer time it takes to transcribe manually.

Accordingly, it's easier to check yourself when listening or learning a language. Apart from that, users can also get many features, like the following:

More language support: Aside from US and UK English, many transcription tools support different languages, from the most common to lesser-known ones.Editable text: Yes, it's possible to edit the text in automatic transcription. However, it's much easier to add, remove, or change parts from software-generated digital documents.Faster transcription: One clear advantage of automatic transcription is speed. Instead of painfully waiting for hours and doing tedious tasks, transcription tools make things faster and easier at the same time. With only a few clicks, an audio file can have a completely transcribed passage.

Manual and automatic transcription are both helpful in mastering a language faster and effectively. They can make the challenging process involved in language learning more enjoyable and interesting.

The post How Using Transcriptions Can Improve Your Listening Skills appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

15 Online Language Lessons to Learn Italian for Free

There are many ways to learn Italian for free.

Wait, did you think learning Italian meant breaking the bank? Think again. The internet is full of Italian language lessons that cost nothing. They come in every format:

Table of contentsLearn Italian for Free with Audio LessonsLearn Italian on SpotifyOne World ItalianoForeign Service Institute, Italian FAST4 Online Podcasts to Help You Learn Italian for FreeItalianPod101Learn Italian PodCon Parole Nostre6 Free Online Video Channels for Learning ItalianSpeak Italian With Your Mouth FullItalian MasteryLearn Italian with MarcoItalianPod101ItalianissimoIlenia Zodiaco’s YouTube Channel3 Free Online Italian Courses and SystemsItalian Online ClubIluss Free ResourcesDuolingo ItalianWant Even More Resources to Learn Italian?

With these, you won’t have to worry about spending a single centesimo (“cent”) on your Italian lessons!

You might wonder if these free resources are good quality, though. Don’t worry! I’ve scoured the web to find as many high-quality, free Italian language lessons as I could for you.

Italian is one of the most popular languages among the Fluent in 3 Months Challenge participants, and if you want to learn it too, check out the free resources below.

Learn Italian for Free with Audio Lessons

Listening comprehension is one of the toughest aspects of any foreign language. This is why it’s so important to include audio lessons in your Italian study routine.

Here are some of the better no-cost audio resources I’ve found for Italian:

Learn Italian on Spotify

Learn Italian is a Spotify playlist with over 600 short Italian lessons in audio format.

If you’re an absolute beginner in Italian, this is a good place to start. Most of the audios teach basic expressions for the most common situations you can expect to encounter on holiday in Italy.

Each phrase comes in both English and an audio recording of a native speaker saying the phrase.

Listen to each one multiple times, and be sure to repeat after it out loud, to work on your speaking and listening skills at the same time.

One World Italiano

One World Italiano is bursting with useful Italian learning material.

The website contains a 37-part audio course for beginners, a 6-part course for intermediate students, and a 12-part video course.

In the sidebar, there are many more lessons, as well as reading, writing and listening exercises that you can access for free.

Lessons include a recorded audio with a transcript, but also written explanations and examples. There are interactive exercises and fun activities based on Italian songs.

Foreign Service Institute, Italian FAST

The Italian FAST (Familiarization and Short-term Training) Course by FSI Languages is a selection of 30 lessons that the US government’s Foreign Service Institute uses for training its own employees before they’re stationed overseas.

It’s very structured and thorough, and is especially appealing to language learners who prefer a more classroom-oriented approach.

Click on “Student Text” to download the textbook for the course, which includes instructions for how to use the course. Then follow along with the audio lessons.

The difficulty of lessons increases, but the course allows you to always focus on important parts of the language like grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation.

4 Online Podcasts to Help You Learn Italian for Free

Podcasts are one of my favourite language learning tools, and they’re different from audio lessons.

I’ve found that the best way to learn a new language is to [start speaking from day one](https://www.fluentin3months.com/tedx/, because you will learn a language faster and better if you actively use it.

Podcasts are a great way to learn the correct pronunciation of your target language, so they can help you improve your speaking abilities. They’re also useful to improve your understanding of the language and collect new vocabulary.

But most importantly, they give you conversational Italian, not only structured lessons.

If you want to learn more about the benefits and use of podcasts, check out this post. For now, I’ll introduce you to four free Italian podcasts.

Get your Italian lessons in bite-sized episodes whenever you want, either on your computer, tablet or smartphone.

ItalianPod101

It’s a little-known fact that all of the Innovative Language podcasts, including ItalianPod101, are free to sign up for and offer quite a bit of free content.

Sign up for an ItalianPod101 account and check out the lessons available for your skill level. After listening to these lessons, you’ll have a pretty good understanding of how the Innovative Language program works. Then you can decide if you’re interested in upgrading your account to a paid subscription.

Learn Italian Pod

Learn Italian Pod is a playlist of 50 episodes that keep Italian learning short and sweet.

Each episode starts with a brief anecdote or news story narrated in Italian, followed by an explanation of the most important grammar and vocabulary points from the narration.

And the best is that whether you’re in a queue for only four minutes or have 13 minutes to spare when stuck in a traffic jam, Learn Italian Pod has an episode of the right length.

Con Parole Nostre

Con Parole Nostre is an ongoing podcast that features Italian conversations. The title translates to “with our words”.

The podcast’s topics range from Italian gastronomy to the cultural importance of family, which I find amazing! Not only do you learn more vocabulary, but you also become familiar with topics and conversations of everyday Italian life.

Like Learn Italian Pod, Con Parole Nostre keeps its episodes between five and fifteen minutes. It makes it easy to learn Italian, even with a busy schedule!

6 Free Online Video Channels for Learning Italian

Video lessons are especially useful for beginner and intermediate students.

Having visual cues during a lesson helps you to understand what’s going on. Videos can also hold your attention better than purely audio courses can.

And while they might not be as practical as podcasts because you can’t listen to them while doing other things, they’re really important for articulation. When you watch a person speaking, you can understand better the movements they make with their mouths to produce a sound.

Here are six of my favourite video channels to learn Italian for free!

Speak Italian With Your Mouth Full

With Speak Italian With Your Mouth Full, you can learn about Italian cooking and language at the same time.

The whole playlist is a course made up of 13 lessons.

Each lesson is divided into parts. In part 1, you watch an Italian teacher and chef teach new vocabulary and phrases to a class of students. Parts 2 and 3 are a cooking class where you can observe the students learning to cook an Italian dish while using the language material they just learned.

Videos last between eight and twenty minutes, and they were organised by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Speak Italian With Your Mouth Full is entertaining and interactive: you can hear students learning at the same time as you!

Warning! Watching lessons might make you hungry.

Italian Mastery

Italian Mastery is a YouTube course that contains over 150 detailed lessons about Italian grammar and vocabulary.

With these videos, you can learn about every aspect of grammar that a beginner to intermediate student could want, such as object contracted pronouns, the various future tenses, and even how to swear in Italian!

Italian Mastery also has a playlist on Italian proverbs. You can compare them with the ones we’ve gathered at Fluent in 3 Months in this post!

Learn Italian with Marco

Learn Italian With Marco is a playlist of video lessons from a very cheerful native Italian speaker who will teach you a huge variety of useful Italian phrases.

The narrator explains the relevant grammar and vocabulary for each phrase to help them stick in your mind.

What’s best is that Marco’s channel also features Italian lessons explained in Spanish! So if you’re not a native English speaker and are more comfortable learning Italian from Spanish, you can do that too!

ItalianPod101

Remember ItalianPod101 from the podcast section?

Well, ItalianPod101 has made many of their videos available to everyone on YouTube, so you don’t have to sign up for a paid subscription to access some of their amazing content.

Check out the listening comprehension videos, which contain a dialogue that you’ll be tested on at the end of the video.

If you’re very short on time, watch one of the “Italian in 3 Minutes” videos for a mini Italian lesson.

Italianissimo

Italianissimo is a BBC series from the ‘90s whose goal was to teach Italian to beginners.

It contains a mix of English and Italian and is appropriate even for absolute beginners. Most of the episodes are around 15 minutes long and feature unscripted conversations with Italians.

Try not to laugh too much at the early ‘90s cheesiness of the show - the material is top notch! Ah, and don’t freak out when you hear prices: Italy is not that expensive! Since the show was filmed before the introduction of the Euro, prices are given in lire italiane (“Italian lira").

Ilenia Zodiaco’s YouTube Channel

Ilenia Zodiaco is an Italian BookTuber and her YouTube Channel is a great platform to browse around.

Ilenia’s Italian is very correct and she articulates her words particularly well, which makes her videos a useful tool for Italian learners. Plus, she talks about literature and reading, so you can also keep up with what Italians read.

Speaking of which… I encourage you to find a couple of book recommendations on her channel. Reading in a language is one of the best ways to pick up vocabulary and grammar!

3 Free Online Italian Courses and Systems

Sometimes it’s just not the right time or place to watch videos or listen to audio lessons. Or maybe listening and watching is not how you prefer to learn a new language.

In any case, take advantage of the courses below so you can study Italian even when “noisy” study methods are out of the question.

Italian Online Club

Italian Online Club is a hidden gem that contains hundreds of lessons for Italian students.

The lessons are organised by difficulty according to CEFR levels, from A1 up to C2.

Click on your level to get started. If you’re not sure of your level, take the placement test by clicking the link at the bottom of the page.

Lessons are kept short and to the point. The website also contains a lot of audio content, but they’re mostly exercises so you can check your progress.

Iluss Free Resources

With Iluss Free Resources, you can learn from structured lessons sorted by skill level.

Each lesson starts with an overview of the grammar point being covered, and then has a series of quizzes to test your knowledge. Many of the quizzes contain fill-in-the-blank questions, but some also include a listening/comprehension component.

The content comes in various formats, including video, audio, and written. One of the advanced lessons introduces you to a classic piece of Italian literature by Leonardo Sciascia!

Duolingo Italian

Duolingo is the go-to app for millions of language learners around the world. It’s perfect for vocabulary and basic grammar exercises to do during your spare moments throughout the day.

While I don’t recommend it be used exclusively, Duolingo Italian can be a very useful supplement to your Italian studies.

It has a competitive system that motivates you to have a daily practice.

Want Even More Resources to Learn Italian?

If you’re looking for more resources, you can always check out my go-to list of Italian resources! It’s a page with all my favourite resources to learn Italian from all over the Internet.

And last but not least, have a look at Fluent in 3 Months’s Italian content as well! We love to serve you native tips and hacks along with themed vocabulary and grammar.

Now that you’re all set to learn Italian on a budget, it’s time to study!

Buona fortuna! (“Good luck!”)

The post 15 Online Language Lessons to Learn Italian for Free appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.

How to Say “Book” in Spanish (and 30+ More Spanish Words for Bibliophiles)

If you want to learn to say “book” in Spanish, you’re my kind of people.

As a book lover and a language lover, I’ve read books in all four languages I speak fluently, including Spanish! So I know just how to teach you about bookish Spanish vocabulary. I’m beyond happy to do it!

Let’s start with a quick overview. Here’s how you say:

“book” in Spanish - libro“comic book” in Spanish - libro de cómics or cómics“library” in Spanish - biblioteca“bookshop” in Spanish - libreria“to read” in Spanish - leer

Now that you’ve got a taste of Spanish bookish vocabulary, follow me through this post. I’ll teach you more words, give you recommendations, and more!

Grab your favorite bookmark and let’s go!

“Book” in Spanish - How to Say “Book” in Spanish: Libro

The Spanish word for “book” comes from the Latin word liber. Liber describes the raw material for papermaking that the Romans used.

Libro is a masculine noun, so it goes with the articles un (“a”) and el (“the”) if singular. When it is in plural form, libros, the articles become unos (“some”) and los (“the”).

Here is some Spanish vocabulary related to books:

una palabra - “a word” → plural: unas palabrasuna página - “a page” → plural: unas páginasun capítulo - “a chapter” → plural: unos capítulosuna serie - “a series” → plural: unas seriesun título - “a title” → plural: unos títulosel autor/la autora - “the author” → plural: unos autores/unas autorasun escritor/una escritora - “a writer” → plural: unos escritores/unas escritorasun personaje - “a character” → plural: unos personajesuna biblioteca - “a library” → plural: unas bibliotecasuna libreria - “a bookshop” → plural: unas libreriasser un ratón de biblioteca - “to be a bookworm”, literally “a library rat”How to Say “Comic Book” in Spanish: Libro de Cómics or Cómics

Like any other language, Spanish is rich in what it calls extranjerismos. These are foreign words that a language adopts to describe a new concept or object for which it has no word itself.

What sometimes happens with the extranjerismos is that the spelling of the words changes, even if only slightly, to adapt to the new language. Some examples in Spanish include catchú or cachú (“ketchup”) and champú (“shampoo”). The same happens to the words for “comic book”.

In Spanish, a “comic book” is a libro de cómics or simply cómics. You might also hear it as tebeo, the phonetic adaptation of the famous Spanish comic magazine TBO.

Here is some Spanish vocabulary related to comic books:

manga - “manga”cómic or historieta - “comics story”burbuja de diálogo - “speech bubble”onomatopeya - “onomatopeia”dibujante or caricaturista - “cartoonist”tira cómica - “comic strip”webcómics - “webcomics”A List of the Best Hispanic Comics

If comics are your thing, you should check out some of the most famous Hispanic comic book stories and characters.

They include:

Mafalda: an Argentinian 6-year-old girl that will remind you of Lucy and Charlie BrownEl Eternauta: another Argentinian production, except this one is less humorous and centered on an alien invasionCondorito: the Chilean condor whose purpose is only to entertain and represent Chileans in an authentic wayMortadelo y Filemón: two Spanish secret agents that always end up getting the best out of any situation despite their incompetenceCapitán Trueno: which in English translates to “Captain Thunder”, the Spanish knight hero

Before we jump on to the next section… If you’re a fan of comic books, I’ve got a surprise for you. Benny wrote a post on how to talk about superheroes in Spanish with other related vocabulary, and I’m sure it’s right up your alley. Give it a read!

How to Say “Books of the Bible” in Spanish and Other Holy Books

It would be hard to talk about books in Spanish without mentioning Holy Books. Spain, and by consequence all the Hispanic countries, have been tightly tied to religion throughout their histories.

Spain has a strong Catholic culture, so knowing that la Biblia is “the Bible” might be useful to you. The “Books of the Bible” are los libros de la Biblia.

But the religion of Islam has also had a big impact on Spain, and Spain has an important Muslim community today. The holy book of Islam is el Sagrado Corán (“the Sacred Quran”).

It might be more rare for you to come across these holy books in Spanish, but you should still know that they call the Jewish Torah Torá or Pentateuco and the Buddist Tripitaka Tripitaka or Tipitaka.

The Harry Potter Books in Spanish

Nearly as popular as the Bible, the Harry Potter books were translated to Spanish, too. As they’re very famous, I wouldn’t want to let you go to a Hispanic region without knowing how to mention them.

For my fellow Potterheads, here are the Spanish titles of the seven original Harry Potter books:

Harry Potter y la piedra filosofal - “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s/Sorcerer's Stone”Harry Potter y la cámara secreta - “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets” (literally “Harry Potter and the Secret Chamber”)Harry Potter y el prisionero de Azkaban - “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban”Harry Potter y el cáliz de fuego - “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire”Harry Potter y la Orden del Fénix - “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”Harry Potter y el misterio del príncipe - “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” (literally “Harry Potter and the Mystery of the Prince”)Harry Potter y las reliquias de la muerte - “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” (literally “Harry Potter and the Relics of Death”)

If you’re really into the Harry Potter series, you might also want to know that Harry Potter y el legado maldito is the Spanish name for “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child”, Animales fantásticos y dónde encontrarlos is “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them”, Quidditch a través de los tiempos is “Quidditch Through the Ages”, and Los cuentos de Beedle el Bardo is “The Tales of Beedle the Bard”.

Am I missing any?

Read a Book in Spanish

In case I haven’t said this enough, I’ll repeat it: the best way to fluency is full immersion.

But full immersion isn’t only about speaking and listening. It also works with reading. This is why I want to encourage you to read in Spanish.

It will help you to understand idioms and when to use them and improve your use of vocabulary and conjugation. But there’s more, and it’s about your experience as a reader.

As a quadrilingual bookworm (aka someone who has read books in all four languages she knows), I’ve come to know that something will always be lost in translation. A joke out of its culture is out of context, or not all wordplays can be adapted, or alliterations will disappear. You don’t want to miss out on them.

Reading books in Spanish and English works as well, as long as you have to make an effort with a Spanish text. I’ll give you a recommendation in a moment.

Amazon Books in Spanish

After almost bullying you into reading books in Spanish, it would be horrible of me not to help you find some. So I’ve gathered some recommendations for books to read in Spanish.

To make sure they’d be relatively easy to find, I’ve looked for them on Amazon.

Let’s start with a few light reads.

For Beginner and Intermediate Students: Short Stories in Spanish

Short Stories are a great choice if you’re a beginner or intermediate Spanish learner. They allow you to focus on the vocabulary and use of language without having to cram character names or plot twists into your head.

The first short story books you might want to check out are Olly Richards’ Short Stories in Spanish for Beginners and Short Stories in Spanish for Intermediate Learners. Olly’s Uncovered courses teach a foreign language with the help of storytelling, so he knows his way around stories.

Elizabeth tried his Spanish Uncovered course and loved it!

You could also look into Spanish Stories: A Dual-Language Book, a collection of 13 Spanish short stories. It will help you understand not only new Spanish vocabulary but also Spanish culture and the evolution of its literature.

What’s great about this book is that it contains Spanish works by Spanish authors… But they are also translated into English. Comparing the two versions will help you even more than using a translation app could.

For Advanced Learners: Some Isabel Allende Books in Spanish

If you want to read a Spanish book in Spanish, you could turn to one of the most famous Hispanic authors at the moment.

Isabel Allende is a Peruvian author with more than 20 novels under her name. She writes about historical events, reality, and myths and focuses on the life of women. Her works have been translated in 35 languages and she has sold over 70 million copies.

If you’re one of her fans, try reading one of the novels you liked in Allende’s native tongue. If you’ve just discovered her, I can recommend a couple of her books.

You may want to start with her first novel, La Casa de los Espíritus (“The House of the Spirits”). Maybe you’d like to try her most cherished book, the memoir Paula. Or you could read her latest work? It’s Largo Pétalo de Mar (“A Long Petal of the Sea”).

What Is the Book in Spanish?

What is the book that all Spanish lovers should read? This is an interesting question. Its answer obviously depends on who you ask.

I can’t choose only one book, so here are three that often get mentioned:

Don Quijote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra Cien años de soledad by Gabriel García Márquez El alquimista by Paulo CoelhoStart Your Book Club in Spanish

Now that you’ve got a list of potential Spanish reads, why not start your own grupo de lectura (“book club”)?

Being part of a book club is a great way to practice your use of new vocabulary. Plus, it stretches the impact of reading on your learning even further. You’d be able to discuss the culture and history behind what you’re reading.

And it goes without saying that learning along with someone else is motivating. It makes it more fun.

But you might not have many people around you who are willing to be a member of your Spanish book club. (Being elite isn’t for everyone.)

Don’t worry! The Fluent in 3 Months team has got your back for this too. If you can't pull a Spanish book club together, you could join the Fluent in 3 Months Challenge. It’s got a warm community spirit. The Challengers speak of their learning process, share techniques, and support each other.

Spanish is one of the most popular languages in the Challenge, so you’ll surely find reading buddies!

How to Say “to Read” in Spanish: Leer

What kind of bookworm would I be if I wrote a post on bookish vocabulary and didn’t teach you about the verb “to read” in Spanish?

So this is precisely what I want to do before we say goodbye.

“To read” in Spanish is leer. Leer belongs to the second group of Spanish verbs because it ends in -er and, lucky you, it’s regular. This means that it’s one of the simplest verbs to learn in Spanish conjugation.

Reading is amazing in all senses.

To make your knowledge more complete, I’ve prepared a chart with some of the most important tenses so you can learn the conjugation of leer.

But you might like to review the Spanish subject pronouns before. Here is a chart to help you with that.

Spanish Pronouns English Equivalents yo I tú you (singular and informal) vos you (singular and informal only in some Latin American countries) él, ella, usted he, she, you (singular formal) nosotros, nosotras we vosotros, vosotras you (plural informal in Spain) ellos, ellas, ustedes they (masculine or general), they (feminine), you (plural formal)

Now that you’re refreshed, here’s the conjugation chart:

Pretérito Imperfecto Pretérito Perfecto Presente Futuro Condicional Subjuntivo Presente yo leí yo leía yo he leído yo leo yo leeré yo leería yo lea tú leíste tú leías tú has leído tú lees tú leerás tú leerías tú leas vos leíste vos leías vos has leído vos leés vos leerás vos leerías vos leas él, ella, usted leyó él, ella, usted leía él, ella, usted ha leído él, ella, usted lee él, ella, usted leerá él, ella, usted leería él, ella, usted lea nosotros, nosotras leímos nosotros, nosotras leíamos nosotros, nosotras hemos leído nosotros, nosotras leemos nosotros, nosotras leeremos nosotros, nosotras leeríamos nosotros, nosotras leamos vosotros, vosotras leísteis vosotros, vosotras leíais vosotros, vosotras habéis leído vosotros, vosotras leéis vosotros, vosotras leeréis vosotros, vosotras leeríais vosotros, vosotras leáis ellos, ellas, ustedes leyeron ellos, ellas, ustedes leían ellos, ellas, ustedes han leído ellos, ellas, ustedes leen ellos, ellas, ustedes leerán ellos, ellas, ustedes leerían ellos, ellas, ustedes lean Now Go Read a Book in Spanish!

All right, you don’t have to. But like I said earlier in the post, it would be one of the best ways for you to get into contact with real Spanish! If you’re serious about achieving fluency, you might want to think about it.

But I understand you might not have the time or energy for a whole Spanish book right now. If that’s the case, you can look for a great alternative to improve your Spanish.

The best way to do it is to look at this list that Benny Lewis put together. That’s where you’ll find the best resources on the Internet for Spanish learning all in one place!

Well… After all the fun we had, I guess it’s time to say ¡hasta luego! (“goodbye”).

The post How to Say “Book” in Spanish (and 30+ More Spanish Words for Bibliophiles) appeared first on Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips.