Introduction

Contents

1. Comunicándonos en pretérito en el modo indicativo.

2. Verbos irregulares en el tiempo pretérito en el modo indicativo.

3. Estrategias para la comunicación escrita: Siguiendo modelos.

4. Estrategias para la comunicación escrita: Orden cronológico.

5. Estrategias para la comunicación escrita: El párrafo.

6. Estrategias para la comunicación escrita: Evitando la redundancia.

7. El vocabulario necesario para poder viajar.

8. De Perú a España: Hagamos comparaciones de diferentes viajes.

9. Aprendiendo a utilizar el pasado imperfecto del modo indicativo.

10. Resumiendo los tiempos pasados en el modo indicativo: Pretérito e imperfecto.

Vocabulary

Daily work and the many activities we do sometimes make us lose perspective of achievements. Therefore, before proceeding with the next unit we would like you to realize what you are able to express in Spanish:

• Tú puedes describir lugares, personas, objetos y tus actividades diarias.
• Tú puedes hacer comparaciones, expresar tus gustos, tus posesiones y tus planes.
• Tú puedes brindar recomendaciones y también puedes dar direcciones.

While you can express facts, wishes, advice and opinions, you are limited as you can only express yourself in the present tense. As you may remember, the tense indicates when the action is happening. The present tense indicates the action is happening at the present time.

¡Hablo español! à fact à Indicative mood in present tense.

Es importante que hables español à advice à Subjuntive mood in present tense.

!Habla español! à command à Imperative mood in present tense.

As you recall, each of the modes have their own tenses. Looking at the lists below you may remember that some modes have multiple tenses as with the indicative and subjunctive moods, whereas the imperative mood has one tense:

Indicative: Facts

• Present
• Preterit
• Imperfect
• Present perfect
• Past perfect
• Future
• Future perfect
• Conditional

Imperative: Orders

• Present

Subjunctive: wishes

• Present
• Imperfect
• Present perfect
• Past perfect (pluperfect)

It is time to expand your skills by expressing yourself in other tenses. The next tense that we will study is the past tense in the indicative mood.

The past tense is used to express an action that ocurred in the past. In Spanish, as in English, there are several verb tenses that indicate that an action took place in the past. Let’s see the verb forms that we have in English:

I studied. à Simple past

I was studying. à Past progressive

I used to study. à Past with helping verb used to

I did study. à Past emphatic

I have studied. à Present perfect à describes Past action that is completed before another action

I had studied. à Past perfect

Each past tense in Spanish has its own set of endings, just as when we studied the present tenses in each one of the moods. For now, we will focus on two of the past tenses that Spanish has in the indicative mood:

Pretérito à Preterit

Imperfecto à Imperfect

The preterit in the indicative mood is a simple tense formed by adding a set of endings to the stem of the verb. As we studied with the different present tenses in the different moods, the preterit has many irregular verbs that we need to learn.

The imperfect in the indicative mood is also a simple tense formed by adding a set of endings to the stem of the verb. The conjugation is very regular, and we have only three irregular verbs in the imperfect tense.

To use the preterit or the imperfect in the indicative mood, we need to learn their endings and their rules to know when and how to use them. Before we start with el pretérito en el modo indicativo we recommend you make flashcards to help you study the verbs in the preterit.