Vocab test
- Él viajó – He traveled
- Yo viajé – I traveled
- Yo salí – I went out
- ¿Qué bebió? – What did he drink?
- Cada día – Every day
- La semana pasada – Last week
- Hace mucho tiempo – A long time ago
- Hace cinco años – Five years ago
- Con su esposo – With her husband
- Lugares interesantes – Interesting places
Verb of the day
Conjugate the verb HACER (To make / To do) in the preterite tense.
| Yo | Nosotros |
| Tú | Vosotros |
| Él/ Ella/ Usted | Ellos/ Ellas/ Ustedes |
Questions to answer
¿Cómo te fue en India?
¿Caminaste por la ciudad?
¿Ustedes visitaron ese museo?
Ese vino es muy caro, ¿no?
¿Quién bebió mi café?
¿Ya abriste la puerta?
¿Cuándo saliste con ese chico?
¿Adónde saliste a almorzar?
A simple dialogue
Use the Spanish phrases to translate the English dialogue. Write it out and perform it.
- What did you do last summer?
- We went on holiday to Portugal.
- And how was it?
- It was very expensive, but it was lovely.
- Where did you stay?
- We stayed in a very small hotel.
- What did you do?
- We swam in the pool. We also went to the beach and we swam in the sea.
- Did you go on any excursions?
- Yes. We went on an excursion in kayaks on the sea, early one morning, and we saw some beautiful caves.
- Did you enjoy the food?
- Yes, the food was good. We ate nearly all our meals in restaurants. But like I said, it was very expensive.
Use these phrases to translate the dialogue.
¿Disfrutaste la comida?
¿Dónde te quedaste?
¿Hiciste alguna excursión?
¿Qué hiciste el verano pasado?
¿Qué hiciste?
¿Y cómo te fue?
Fue muy caro, pero era precioso.
Nadamos en la piscina. También fuimos a la playa y nadamos en el mar.
Nos fuimos de vacaciones a Portugal.
Nos quedamos en un hotel muy pequeño.
Sí, la comida era buena. Comimos casi todas nuestras comidas en restaurantes. Pero como dije, fue muy caro.
Sí. Hicimos una excursión en kayaks por el mar, una mañana temprano, y vimos unas cuevas preciosas.
Choose from a range of voices to read your dialogue here.
Grammar notes
* Read this information, then use it to quiz a friend.
The preterite tense in Spanish is used to describe actions that were completed in the past. While most verbs follow a regular conjugation pattern, there are many irregular verbs that do not.
Verbs with irregular stems
These verbs have a stem change in the preterite but use a common set of endings. It is useful to compare the regular and irregular endings. Remember, accents determine where the word is stressed in speech.
| Irregular preterite endings | -ar verb regular preterite endings | -er and ir verb regular preterite endings | |
| Yo | -e | -é | -í |
| Tú | -iste | -aste | -iste |
| Él/ Ella/ Usted | -o | -ó | -ió |
| Nosotros | -imos | -amos | -imos |
| Vosotros | -isteis | -asteis | -isteis |
| Ellos/ Ellas/ Ustedes | -ieron (-eron for stems ending in “j”) | -aron | -ieron |
Here are some common verbs with irregular stems. There are -ar, -er and -ir verbs, but they all take the irregular preterite endings because they have irregular stems.
| Infinitive verb | Irregular preterite stem | Yo form (+ forms with spelling changes) |
| tener (to have) | tuv- | tuve |
| estar (to be) | estuv- | estuve |
| venir (to come) | vin- | vine |
| hacer (to do/make) | hic- | hice (él hizo) |
| querer (to want) | quis- | quise |
| decir (to say) | dij- | dije (ellos dijeron) |
| traer (to bring) | traj- | traje (ellos trajeron) |
Completely irregular verbs
- ser/ir fui, fuiste, fue, fuimos, fuisteis, fueron
- dar di, diste, dio, dimos, disteis, dieron
- ver vi, viste, vio, vimos, visteis, vieron
Journal prompts
Write short sentences. Keep them as simple as you can.
Use a translation tool to put them into Spanish.
Write them out, then check them with your teacher. Present them to a friend, teaching your friend any new Spanish, and making sure they learn it!
| Where did you go on vacation? How did you travel? How long ago was your vacation? Do you want to go back? What did you see? What was the best bit? | ¿Adónde fuiste de vacaciones? ¿Cómo viajaste? ¿Hace cuánto fueron tus vacaciones? ¿Quieres volver? ¿Qué viste? ¿Cuál fue la mejor parte? |
Next lesson: 3.22 Go shopping
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Key features.
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- List of 20 vocabulary items to learn for each unit
- Space to note Duolingo phrases
- A conjugated verb for each unit
- Duolingo inspired questions to answer with the help of AI
- A simple on-theme dialogue for each unit
- Grammar explanations for each unit
- Suggested websites for further study
- Journal prompts to encourage the Spanish journaling habit
- Teaching notes and ideas
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