Grammatical Terms

Here are a few general grammatical terms that are frequently used for teaching Spanish.

Adjective: Describes a noun. In Spanish, the adjective has to agree in gender and in form to the noun.

Noun: A person, place, thing or thought. In Spanish, nouns are either masculine or feminine.

Article: The article generally goes before the noun. A definite article translates to: “the”. The indefinite article translates to: “a” or “some”. Articles must agree in gender and in form to the noun it modifies.

Verb: Basically a word that describes an action.

Verb-ending: Every verb in Spanish will end in either –ar, -er or –ir. These are also the verb endings, and are usually replaced when the verb is conjugated.

Stem of a verb: It is the main part of the verb or what is left after taking off the verb ending.

Stem-Change: Refers to the action of having the stem of the verb change when it is conjugated to a certain tense.

Preposition: Is a word that connects words and, according to the thought expressed in the sentence, serves to indicate the relationship between the words.

Gender: In Spanish every noun has a gender, either masculine or feminine. This is very important, because all adjectives have to agree with the noun's gender.

Singular/Plural: Singular means when you are indicating just one object. Plural, when you are indicating two or more objects.

Conjugation: The modification of a verb, according to what tense or mood you desire it to be.

Adverbs: A word that modifies a verb, an adjective, or another adverb.