I’m offering a 12-month subscription to my Spanish course for only $75.

My Spanish course includes:

• A 60-day money back guarantee
• 45 beginners’ online lessons
• 45 kids’ lessons
• Downloadable mp3s
• Downloadable videos
• Online mp3 listening
• Spanish language learning articles
• A Spanish verb ebook
• Beginners’ quizzes
• Kids’ quizzes
• Full access to the members-only forum
• Answers to your language questions by me
• First-rate customer service

At spanish-bookworld.com I have put plenty of details about my course. I’ve also added the Lessons 1, 2 and 3 free samples and free quizzes.

The online lessons, mp3s and videos come with: dialogs, flashcards, grammar, pronunciation and numbers.

All the online lessons are interactive and multimedia, and all the Spanish words and sentences in them have been recorded by native Spanish speakers.

This course has been written and created by me, Maria Fernandez, a highly experienced native Spanish teacher. This is the third Spanish course I’ve published. I’m currently working on a series of Spanish language learning ebooks as well as adding new material to my online course. Find out more about me and Spanish Bookworld.

Here’s a free Spanish language learning quiz from my Spanish course. It’s the first of the two review quizzes that you get in Lesson 1. Press Start to play it:

You can find many more language learning quizzes in my Spanish course. Those quizzes help you review what you learn in the online lessons, downloadable mp3s and videos.

All my quizzes come with listening comprehension questions, grammar drills, vocabulary and number exercises, spelling practice, and much more. Hope you like them!

This is what the Spanish language learning videos in my course look like on your iPod and iPhone:

On my Spanish Bookworld website you can download a free video sample from my Spanish course and put it on your iPod and iPhone, and you can also watch a free video sample online.

You can download the videos and mp3s in my Spanish course when you subscribe. Subscriptions cost $19.99 per month and come with a 60-day money-back guarantee.

My Spanish course contains 45 lessons with 5 videos and 5 mp3s each, plus online lessons, kids’ lessons, articles, an ebook and a members-only forum where you can post me all your Spanish language questions.

Knowing the six forms of the irregular Spanish verb estar in the present tense will allow you to build and understand essential sentences, questions and answers. You can listen to the six forms, together with all the Spanish examples in this post, and play the interactive drill, in the Lesson 4 – Grammar of my free Spanish course.

1. Estar in the present tense

Here’s what the Spanish verb estar looks like in the present tense and how you translate it:

2. Examples with estar

Here are some examples with the six forms we’ve just learned, in both Spanish and English:

3. When to use the verb estar

Estar is one of two Spanish verbs that translates as ‘to be’. The other verbs is ser, which we’ll learn in a future post.

The verb estar is used to indicate:

• Where people or things are
• Moods and feelings
• Physical conditions
• Physical appearance at some point in time
• Temporary rather than permanent conditions

To illustrate these five points, here are five examples with their English translation:

4. Speaking drill

Can you say these ten sentences in Spanish? You can see the solutions in Spanish and hear them said by native speakers in the Lesson 4 – Grammar of my free Spanish course.

1. How are they?
2. They’re angry
3. Which hotel are you (vosotros) in?
4. We’re in the Arizona hotel
5. Where are you (tú)?
6. Is he at the hotel?
7. Is she on the beach?
8. You’re (tú) looking very elegant
9. I’m on vacation
10. Are they on vacation?

To get this and other grammar lessons:

All the kids’ lessons in my free Spanish course are interactive: they include multimedia flashcards you can see and hear, speaking exercises and listening drills.

Like all my other Spanish lessons, mp3s and videos, they have been recorded by native speakers.

The kids’ lessons in my courses include topics such as: the family, numbers, animals, colors, names, greetings, professions, the time, asking questions; useful words like ‘the’, ‘a’, ‘some’, ‘and’, ‘I’, etc.; the alphabet, the days of the week, food, clothes, and more.

If you want to see the full list of topics, here is the lesson plan.

To show you what the interactive multimedia lessons for kids in my free Spanish course look like, here are five snapshots:

 

Sign up for free!

To help you learn Spanish better and faster, I’ll be posting on this blog the definition of the main grammatical terms together with practical examples. You can also find them in Lesson 1 of my free Spanish course. Today’s post is about:

ADJECTIVES

Adjectives are words used to describe or modify nouns and pronouns.

Here are some examples in English:

1. Adjectives – describing words

In these three examples the word black is a describing word which modifies the noun cat.

There is one other describing word in the examples above. Can you tell which one it is? Post your answer (or guess) in the comment box!

2. Adjectives – possession

Adjectives, however, are not just describing words, but they can also indicate possession:

In these two cases the words my and your indicate who the owner of the cat is.

3. Comparing English and Spanish

In Spanish grammar, adjectives work in a similar way. Observe these examples:

Notice that describing words in Spanish generally go after the noun they describe (gato negro) and not before it (black cat).

Here are the possessive adjective examples we saw above in Spanish:

Notice that the possessive adjective goes before the noun in both English and Spanish (my cat – mi gato).

4. More grammatical terms

This is what Lesson 1 of my free Spanish course looks like:

 

 

Sign up for free!

At www.spanish-bookworld.com I’ve set up a free Spanish language course with online lessons, downloadable mp3s and videos, kids’ lessons and language learning articles.

The online lessons have five sections: dialog, flashcards, grammar, pronunciation and numbers.

The online lessons, mp3s and videos all include learning material, speaking exercises and listening drills. They’ve all been recorded by native Spanish speakers.

This free Spanish course is available to you right now. Hope you like it! Below are some snapshots from the course.

The Spanish greeting ‘buenas tardes‘ translates both as ‘good afternoon‘ and ‘good evening‘; and the greeting ‘buenas noches‘ means both ‘good evening‘ and ‘good night‘.

So, when do you use ‘buenas tardes’ and ‘buenas noches’?

Unlike in English, these two Spanish greetings have more to do with meals and the sunset than with the actual time of day.

Therefore, ‘buenas tardes’ is usually said after lunch, which is often from 2.00 pm. ‘Buenas noches’, especially in the summer, is usually said after 9.00 pm. In winter, many people say ‘buenas tardes’ at least until 8.00 pm, even if it’s dark; and many only use ‘buenas noches’ after dinner, which tends to be from 9.00 pm.

When using ‘buenas noches’, remember that it’s not only a farewell, but also a greeting. You can use it both when you meet someone and when you leave.

As you can see, there is no golden rule as to when to use these Spanish greetings. The important point is that they’re vague and flexible. Best of all, there’s an easy way out if you’re unsure as to which one to use: you can simply say ‘buenas’.

If you want to practice saying these and other Spanish greetings, you can hear them said by native speakers in the Lessons 2, 3 and 4 of my Spanish course. Here are two samples:

Lesson 2 dialog and flashcards

Here are the most common Spanish greetings, together with their English translation:

You can hear these greetings said by native Spanish speakers in the first four lessons of my Spanish for beginners course. Here are the Lesson 1 flashcards:

Learning tip

To learn new Spanish words well, make sure you hear them said by native speakers, rather than someone without a native accent. Learning from native speakers is essential if you want to avoid bad pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar habits.

In this free Spanish pronunciation lesson we’re going to learn how to pronounce the vowel ‘a’ correctly.

You can hear all the Spanish words in this post, including the exercise at the end, in the free Lesson 1 of my Spanish for beginners course.

1. Tips on how to get the Spanish ‘a’ always right

• The Spanish a sounds like the ‘a’ in the English word: ‘father’.
• The Spanish a has a pure, unchangeable sound. You should pronounce it always the same way.
• The Spanish a sounds the same whether it comes at the beginning of a word, in the middle, at the end or on its own.
• Often it will be tempting to say the a like in the English words ‘table’ or ‘hand‘. Unfortunately, doing so will make it difficult for Spanish speakers to understand you.

Pronouncing the vowel ‘a’ correctly will dramatically help you communicate successfully in Spanish.

2. Difficult Spanish words with the letter ‘a’

To master the Spanish a, practice saying words that look similar in English and Spanish. Those words often sound quite different in Spanish, and it can take a while to get them consistently right.

Here are ten words that will help you quickly master the a. To hear them said by native speakers, go to the multimedia Lesson 1 of my Spanish for beginners course. It’s free.

3. Saying a difficult Spanish sentence

Here’s a sentence with several words with the letter a. Read out this sentence paying particular attention to the way you say each a. In my free Lesson 1 you can hear this sentence said slowly and at normal speed.

Can you say this sentence fluently? Try every so often over the next few days and you will soon master it!

4. Spanish pronunciation exercise

We are now going to practice saying ten very useful words: ten place names. They all contain at least one a. Can you say them out loud correctly?

Remember that you can hear all the Spanish words in this post in the free Lesson 1 of my Spanish for beginners course. There you can also download the free Lesson 1 podcast and videocast, and go through them on your iPod or any other mp3 player.

Do you have any questions? Are there any Spanish words you are not sure how to pronounce? If so, please let me know through the comment box below.