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:

 

 

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In this free Spanish lesson we’re going to learn what’s your name in Spanish and how to introduce yourself.

If you want to hear all the examples in this lesson, you can find them in the free Lesson 2 of my Spanish for beginners course.

1. How to ask people their names, and how to answer the question

This is how you ask someone his or her name in Spanish:

and this is how you answer when people ask you your name:

2. Examples

Here are six examples where you can practice asking people their names and introducing yourself:

3. The literal meaning of ‘¿cómo te llamas?’ and ‘me llamo …’

Here’s what ¿cómo te llamas? and me llamo … mean word for word:

* The word cómo usually means how.
* Te llamas literally means you call yourself.
* When you ask ¿cómo te llamas? what you’re saying is how do you call yourself?
* Likewise, me llamo literally means I call myself.
* When you say me llamo …, what you are saying, literally, is I call myself …

4. How to pronounce ‘¿cómo te llamas?’ and ‘me llamo …’

In the free Lesson 2 of my Spanish for beginners course you can hear all the sentences in this article said by native Spanish speakers, including myself.

When you listen to them, notice how the intonation rises at the end of the question, but not at the end of the answer.

5. Exercise

In the free Lesson 2 of my Spanish for beginners course you can do the interactive multimedia drill to practice what you’ve learned here.