La historia de Europa en 3 minutos

Continuando con la clase de historia de España, aquí tenéis un video muy ilustrativo de las transformaciones en las fronteras en Europa, que puede ayudar mucho a entender la historia de lo que llegará a ser España en el siglo XX y XXI.

Investigación Cultural

-Cultural research points are given individually, reflecting effort and student level. Points awarded can change depending on student.

-Each student has to achieve 7 cultural research points each half term, without deadlines.

-Students can choose an activity from the proposed pool, or agree a new one with the teacher.
-There will be a prize for the top achiever and the most interesting project every half term.

1 Point tasks:

Watch a chapter of a series in Spanish and write a brief review.

Watch a film related to a Spanish speaking country´s culture or history, write a brief review.

Read an article about a relevant topic in a Spanish newspaper and write a brief summary.

3 points tasks:

Watch a film in Spanish and write a review.

Read a book about a Spanish speaking country´s culture or history, write a brief review.

Go to a restaurant and write a review.
Go to a Spanish art or history exhibition and write a review.

5 points tasks:

Read several articles about a relevant topic in different Spanish newspapers. Write a journalistic article about the topic in Spanish.

Cook a dish, take photos and write a post for the blog with the receipt. Bring a taster to the teacher.

Read a short story in Spanish. Write a review.

Leave your proposals in the comments!

La Excepción

http://grooveshark.com/laexcepcion

I noticed that "La Excepción" was one, if not the most, succesfull song the other day. Here you have a playlist from this Hip Hop band.

Karaoke en español

Imperfect and Preterite Contrasted

A. The preterite is a "perfect" tense because it reports events viewed as completed within a finite time frame. An "imperfect" tense conveys duration, progression, incompleteness:

IMPERFECT (duration)	PERFECT (PRETERITE: completion)
Los indígenas no aceptaban a los europeos. The natives would not accept Europeans (for some time).	Algunos nunca los aceptaron. Some (definitely) never did.
El sábado nevaba y hacía frío. It was snowing on Saturday, and it was cold. (for some time)	El sábado nevó todo el día. It snowed all day on Saturday. (time frame)
El año pasado asistía mucho a conciertos. Last year I used to attend concerts a lot (often).	El año pasado asistí a muchos conciertos. Last year I attended many concerts.

B. For narration, each tense has a distinct function:

IMPERFECT (duration)	PRETERITE (completion)
gives background information, describes what was happening	reports completed actions, tells what happened
It was raining... Llovía (o estaba lloviendo)...	when I woke up, cuando me desperté.
describes a state or condition	reports a change in condition
He was fine before the winter, ... Estaba bien antes del invierno, ...	but in January he got sick because of the cold. pero en enero se enfermó por el frío.

C. As was mentioned in §28, a few verbs have slightly different meanings in the preterite. All of them, however, follow the general idea of duration for the imperfect and of completeness for the preterite:

	Imperfect	Preterite
poder	could, had the ability to	managed to (or failed to if negative)
querer	wanted, had the intention to	tried to (or refused if negative)
conocer	previously knew for some time	met, got to know for the first time
saber	had knowledge for some time	learned, found out at a specific point

See §22 to review the difference between conocer and saber

Los conocía antes de viajar. I knew them before traveling.	Los conocí al viajar. I met them while traveling
¿Qué sabía Bush del ataque? What did Bush know of the attack?	¿Cuándo supo Bush del ataque? When did Bush find out about the attack?
No sabía que eras chilena. I did not know you were Chilean.	Ayer supe que eras de Chile. Yesterday I learned you were from Chile.
De niño podía jugar todo el día. As a child, I could play all day.	También pude hacer muchos amigos. I also had the opportunity to make many friends.
Como no podíamos salir, ... Since we couldn’t go out, ...	no pudimos ver los fuegos artificiales. we were unable to see the fireworks.
Queríamos ir de compras, ... We wanted to go shopping, ...	pero mi madre no quiso darnos dinero. but my mother refused to give us some money.

The original website of this content + some exercises here.

The Imperfect / El imperfecto

 A. REGULAR AND IRREGULAR IMPERFECT FORMS

1. Regular:
ayudar  ayudaba, ayudabas, ayudaba, ayudábamos, ayudabais, ayudaban (used to help)
atender  atendía, atendías, atendía, atendíamos, atendíais, atendían (used to pay attention to)
asistir  asistía, asistías, asistía, asistíamos, asistíais, asistían (used to attend)

2. Only three verbs have irregular forms in the imperfect:

ir:

iba ibas iba íbamos ibais iban

ser:

era eras era éramos erais eran

ver:

veía veías veía veíamos veíais veían

 B. USES OF THE IMPERFECT / USOS DEL IMPERFECTO

1. To describe in the past: the background or setting, situations, conditions, and actions that were in progress (was/were ...ing):

Eran las seis. Tenía doce años. Estaba enfermo y leía en cama. Afuera llovía. De pronto...

It was six. I was twelve. I was sick and was reading in bed. It was raining outside. Suddenly...

2. To describe habitual, customary actions, or things that used to happen in the past without specific reference to a beginning or end (imperfective, incomplete) (used to, would):

Iban al cine todos los viernes. Iba mucho al parque cuando era joven. Estaba informada porque leía mucho.

They used to go to the movies every Friday. I would to go the park a lot when I was young. She was (and stayed) informed because she (habitually) read a lot.

This means that time expressions conveying repetition are often clues for selecting the imperfect: con frecuencia, cada semana, siempre, a veces, etc.

Tip:  Whenever you could say used to or was/were...ing in English, you need the imperfect in Spanish.

The original website of this content + some exercises here.

The Preterite Tense / El tiempo pretérito

 A. REGULAR AND IRREGULAR PRETERITE FORMS see charts by Professor Barbara Kuczun Nelson

1. Regular:
ayudar ayudé, ayudaste, ayudó, ayudamos, ayudasteis, ayudaron (helped)
atender atendí, atendiste, atendió, atendimos, atendisteis, atendieron (took care of, paid attention to)
asistir asistí, asististe, asistió, asistimos, asististeis, asistieron (attended)

2. Most Common Irregular Preterites:

dar : decir: estar: hacer: poder: poner: querer: saber: ser / ir: tener: traer: venir:

di dije estuve hice pude puse quise supe fui tuve traje vine

diste dijiste estuviste hiciste pudiste pusiste quisiste supiste fuiste tuviste trajiste viniste

dio dijo estuvo hizo pudo puso quiso supo fue tuvo trajo vino

dimos dijimos estuvimos hicimos pudimos pusimos quisimos supimos fuimos tuvimos trajimos vinimos

disteis dijisteis estuvisteis hicisteis pudisteis pusisteis quisisteis supisteis fuisteis tuvisteis trajisteis vinisteis

dieron dijeron estuvieron hicieron pudieron pusieron quisieron supieron fueron tuvieron trajeron vinieron

3. Observations:
• The 3rd plural ending of decir and traer is -eron and not -ieron.
• Ver is regular, but its stem is only the letter v: vi, viste, vio, vimos, vieron.
• Verbs derived from irregular verbs are like them in every way. For example, the preterite of obtener is obtuve.
Other common examples: distraer, distraje; intervenir, intervine; predecir, predije; proponer, propuse; satisfacer, satisfice; sostener, sostuve.
• The 3rd person singular and plural of -er and -ir verbs whose stems end in a vowel, will end in -yó and -yeron:
   caer: cayó, cayeron  •  construir: construyó, construyeron  •  creer: creyó, creyeron  •  
   destruir: destruyó, destruyeron  •  influir: influyó, influyeron  •  leer: leyó, leyeron  •  oír: oyó, oyeron.
• The slightly irregular forms of the preterite of reír (and sonreír) are as follows:
reí, reíste, rio, reímos, reísteis, rieron
• All -ir stem-changing verbs change -o to -u or -e to -i in the third person singular and plural of the preterite
(see summary):
dormir: durmió, durmieron  •  repetir: repitió, repitieron  •  divertir: divirtió, divirtieron
• Regular verbs ending in -car, -gar, -guar, and -zar have a spelling change in the first person singular to maintain the pronunciation of the stem according to Spanish consistent system (see §1):
buscar: busqué  •  llegar: llegué  •  averiguar: averigüé  •  empezar: empecé.
• Verbs ending in –ducir (conducir, deducir, inducir):
produje, produjiste, produjo, produjimos, produjisteis, produjeron

B.  USES OF THE PRETERITE / USOS DEL PRETÉRITO

1. to express events completed once or several times in the past ("complete" events):

Entré y me senté. Me ayudó varias veces. ¿Decidiste asistir a la conferencia?

I came in and sat down. He assisted me several times. Did you decide to attend the lecture?

2. to express actions that have clear beginnings or ends (framed within a finite time period, seen as complete):

Vivió allí desde 1958. Julio César vivió 57 años. Bebieron hasta las cuatro de la mañana.

He lived there since 1958. Julius Caesar lived for 57 years. They drank until four am.

The original website of this content + some exercises here.

Crónica de la guerra europea 1914-1918

Spain and the Hispano-American countries were neutral during the Great War, but the first big novel about it was by an Spaniard: Vicente Blasco Ibañez. It was an instant world wide best seller, first published in 1916 and translated into English in 1919. His novel was translated into many languages and had two film adaptations. If you want to know more...

Inmigrantes españoles en Alemania

"La inmigración en Europa es un problema" ¿Estás o no estás de acuerdo con esta afirmación?

Presente de subjuntivo

The Forms of the Present Subjunctive / Las formas del presente del subjuntivo

	present indicative	PRESENT SUBJUNCTIVE
ayudar poner seguir	yo ayud-ø   yo pong-ø   yo sig-ø	ayude ayudes ayude ayudemos ayudéis ayuden ponga pongas ponga pongamos pongáis pongan siga sigas siga sigamos sigáis sigan

In order to form the present subjunctive, use the first person singular of the present indicative –the yo form–, remove the -o, and add endings in -e for -ar verbs, and endings in -a for -er and -ir verbs. This change of vowel may involve some spelling changes:
pag-ø  pague busc-ø  busque empiez-ø  empiece

• Stem-changing verbs in -ar and -er change their stems in the same way and in the same cases as in the present indicative:

piense vuelva

pienses vuelvas

piense vuelva

pensemos volvamos

penséis volváis

piensen vuelvan

• Stem-changing verbs in -ir, whatever the change that occurs in the present indicative, change the stem of thenosotros and vosotros forms of the present subjunctive from e to i and from o to u. (see complete rules.)

muera sienta pida

mueras sientas pidas

muera sienta pida

muramos sintamos pidamos

muráis sintáis pidáis

mueran sientan pidan

Only six verbs do not follow the rules above to form the present subjunctive:

ir  →  vaya, vayas, vaya, vayamos, vayáis vayan ser  →  sea seas sea seamos seáis sean estar  →  esté estés esté estemos estéis estén saber  →  sepa sepas sepa sepamos sepáis sepan haber  →  haya hayas haya hayamos hayáis hayan (subjunctive for hay) dar  →  dé des dé demos deis den

Subjunctive?

All the verbs we have studied so far have been in the Indicative Mood because they indicate states or actions that are presented as factual. The Subjunctive Mood is used, mostly in dependent clauses, after verbs that suggest non-factual events, such as indirect commands, doubts, subjective perception, etc. Compare the following two groups of sentences:

Presented as factual (indicative):	Desired, doubted (subjunctive):
I insist that he is here. Insisto en que está aquí.	I insist that he be here. Insisto en que esté aquí.
I believe he did it. Creo que lo hizo.	I demand that he do it. Exijo que lo haga.
I know he is here. Sé que está aquí.	I doubt he'll be here. Dudo que esté aquí.

The original website of this content + some exercises here.