Studying Spanish could be daunting.

You’ve gotten unusual new phrases, accents and symbols that you simply’ve by no means seen in English.

They will appear to be monsters growling at you.

Properly, don’t have any concern: I’m right here that can assist you and encourage you as you begin bettering your Spanish studying abilities.

Contents

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Learn Spanish Letters 

We’re going to begin with the fundamentals—the ABCs.

You in all probability realized your English ABCs with a tune, and that’s what we’re going to do right here with Spanish. Go forward and watch this YouTube clip of the Spanish ABCs first.

The very first thing you need to learn about studying Spanish is that it’s a phonetic language, in contrast to English. In different phrases, each letter makes the identical sound within the alphabet because it does in a phrase.

Let’s take the Spanish letter a for example. A will all the time make the “ah” sound, as in “father.” That is completely different from English, the place “ok” can have a tough sound like in “kitty” or no sound like in “information.”

However that’s the excellent news. If Spanish is phonetic, which means when you’ve mastered the sound for every Spanish letter, you’ll be capable of sound out phrases very simply in Spanish.

Let’s begin with the vowels.

Vowels

You’ll be exhausting pressed to accurately spell or learn Spanish phrases for those who don’t know the fundamental vowel sounds.

The beauty of Spanish is that the vowels, in my view, are simpler to grasp than in English. You don’t have guidelines like “when two vowels go a strolling” or “i earlier than e besides after c…” What you see is what you get. Vowels in Spanish all the time make the identical sound.

Spanish Vowel	What It Sounds Like
A	“ah” as in “ah ha!” or “father”
E	“eh” as in “excuse” or “mattress”
I	“ee” as in “beet” or “search”
O	“oh” as in “know” or “open”
U	“oo” as in “sue” or “do.”

The u is the one vowel that’s a little bit tough. In some phrases, it doesn’t make a sound, however extra on that later.

Silent Letters

Now that we now have the vowel sounds, let’s transfer on to the consonants. There are a couple of consonants in Spanish that by no means make a sound. (Why they’re within the alphabet in any respect is a thriller to me. However they’re there and we have to study them.)

Spanish Silent Letter	Pronunciation Rule	Instance
H	H is all the time silent in Spanish.	Hijo is pronounced “ee-ho.”
U	When coupled with q and g, the letter u is silent.	Guitarra is pronounced “gee-tar-ah.”
Ps	When you see these two letters collectively, the p is silent.	Psicología is pronounced “see-koh-loh-hee-ah.”

Extra Difficult Consonants

The Letter C

This could both be pronounced just like the letter s ( serpiente
or “snake”), as within the phrase acelga
(chard or a kind of beet), or with a tough sound as seen in casa
(home). How will you know which technique to learn it?

Spanish C	What It Sounds Like	Instance
CA	exhausting c	casa (KA-sa) or “home”
CE	comfortable c	celeste (se-LES-te) or “heavenly”
CI	comfortable c	cinco (SEEN-co) or “5”
CO	exhausting c	cosa (KO-sa) or “factor”
CU	exhausting c	cuerpo (KU-ER-po) or “physique”

The Letters B and V

In Spanish, the sound of those two letters is equivalent—a lot in order that they’re also known as be larga
(lengthy B) and be corta
(brief B or the English “V”). When studying these two letters, they make the identical sound because the English B in “ball.”

Whereas the sound is identical in commonplace Spanish, which may not be the case in some areas. If you wish to know extra, take a look at this article, which works extra in-depth on the b vs. v situation.

The Letter LL

It’s possible you’ll be considering, “that’s two letter L’s.” Nope. It’s one letter known as the doble ele
(actually “double l”). When two Ls are put subsequent to one another in Spanish, they make a unique sound than only one L. If you see them collectively as LL, they make a sound just like the English letter J.

Spanish Phrases That Use LL	Pronunciation	English Translation
llevar	yay-var	carry
lluvia	yu-vee-ah	rain

If you wish to examine the LL in additional element, right here’s an article you’ll be able to take a look at. And if you wish to see extra phrases that use “ll” and the way they sound, learn this text.

The Letter Ñ 

Ñ
 often is the most intimidating letter in Spanish as a result of it doesn’t exist in English. It’s used fairly often and has a novel sound. This letter known as the enyay.

It’s pronounced just like the “ni” seen in onion. You in all probability acknowledge and already know find out how to say  piñata
(peen-ya-ta)

Spanish Phrases That Use Ñ	Pronunciation	English Translation
baño	bah-nyo	lavatory
Señor Señora	seh-nyohr seh-nyoh-ra	Sir/Mr. Madam/Mrs.

One of the best ways to turn out to be acquainted with this letter is to listen to a local say it. That method, you’ll be capable of actually hear how the letter sounds. Right here’s a YouTube hyperlink that may assist you to with that, and an article the place all of the phrases begin with this letter.

The Remainder of the Letters

Let’s transfer on to the opposite letters. Most of those are fairly self-explanatory for those who hearken to the ABC tune.

There are a couple of letters which might be more durable to learn as a result of they both sound like different letters or they make a number of sounds. Check out the remainder of the Spanish letters we haven’t mentioned but:

Different Spanish Letters	What It Sounds Like
D	deh
F	efeh
G	heh
J	hota
Ok	kah
L	elle
M	eme
N	ene
P	peh
Q	coo
R	ere
S	eseh
T	teh
W	doble beh (not present in Spanish origin phrases)
X	ekis
Y	yeh
Z	seta

Learn Spanish Accents (Tilde)

After I began studying Spanish, the accents had been what confused me most. Nevertheless, they’re extremely vital when writing and studying Spanish. Accents give phrases readability. How so?

Properly, maybe you’ve seen that there are some phrases in Spanish which might be precisely the identical—besides that one has an accent.

Phrase With out Accent Mark	Phrase With Accent Mark
Si (If)	Sí  (Sure)
Tu (Your)	Tú  (You)
El (The)	Él  (He)
Mi (My)	Mí (Me)

There are a number of different phrases like this. As you’re studying, one of the best device you’ve in your belt is context clues. When you’re uncertain, learn sentences with each choices.

Learn Stress in Spanish Phrases

Now, let’s put collectively every part we’ve realized to this point and determine precisely find out how to pronounce some Spanish phrases. The place can we put the stress?

There are 4 foremost guidelines relating to stress in Spanish.

Phrases ending in N, S or a vowel with out written accent

If a phrase ends in a vowel, the stress goes on the second to final syllable.

Phrases Ending In N, S or a Vowel With out Accent Marks	Pronunciation	English Translation
nada	na-da	nothing / none
acento	a-cen-to	accent
refrigeradores	re-fri-ge-ra-do-res	fridges

Phrases ending in a consonant (besides N and S) with no written accent

If a phrase ends in a consonant, the stress is on the final syllable of the phrase.

Phrases Ending in a Consonant (Besides N and S) With No Accent Marks	Pronunciation	English Translation
cantar	can-tar	sing
refrigerador	re-fri-ge-ra-dor	fridge

Phrases with tildes

If a phrase has a  tilde
(written accent), the stress goes on that syllable.

Phrases With Tildes	Pronunciation	English Translation
así	a-sí	so, thus, as nicely
biología	bio-lo-gí-a	biology
rápido	rá-pi-do	quick
devuélvemelo	de-vuél-ve-me-lo	give it again (to me)

Phrases that finish with mente

If a phrase ends with –mente (i.e., Spanish adverbs), then you definately’re going to have two stresses. On this case, one stress might be on the robust syllable of the adjective (tris-te, rá-pi-da, and many others.) and one other might be on the males of –mente.

Phrases That Finish With -mente	Pronunciation	English Translation
tristemente	tris-te-males-te	sadly
rápidamente	rá-pi-da-males-te	rapidly

Enhance Your Spanish Studying Expertise

Now that you simply’re an professional on the foundations of studying Spanish, you’ll be able to take a look at your abilities! Listed below are a couple of ideas you should use.

Begin Studying Straightforward Spanish Texts

You’ve solely simply mastered studying the Spanish letters, so that you don’t need to leap into studying Cervantes immediately. Take it straightforward for now with Spanish brief tales. When you’re finished with these, you’ll be able to progress to Spanish novels for newbies.

Remember that you simply’re in all probability going to come across phrases you haven’t studied but, so have your useful pocket book (or note-taking app) with you as you agree in and let Spanish authors take you into different worlds with their phrases.

Learn Alongside With a Video

For instance, right here’s a hyperlink to a person studying a brief story in Spanish. The perfect factor you are able to do is pause the video earlier than he begins studying (which is roughly across the 2:09 mark). Learn the passage aloud to your self and file your voice studying it. Then hearken to how he reads it and examine it to your individual recording.

It could appear to be a tedious activity, however for those who try this, you’ll hear the distinction in your studying and his studying.

You are able to do this exercise with just about any subtitled Spanish video—ideally one which options genuine dialogue, just like the brief video clips on FluentU. These embrace film clips, information segments, inspirational talks and even animated brief tales. The movies on FluentU could be paused by hovering your cursor over the interactive subtitles.

Click on on any phrase to see its that means and pronunciation, in addition to clips from different movies the place the phrase is used for extra context and accents. Learn the phrase out loud and attempt to match your pronunciation to that of the video. It can save you phrases as flashcards to observe them some extra.

And on the iOS and Android app variations of FluentU, you’ll get an opportunity to talk the phrases out loud.

Make It Enjoyable With Video games

Who says studying in Spanish needs to be a dry and boring train? There are a great variety of video games you’ll be able to play to study numerous points of Spanish. For instance, Influent lets you purchase new vocabulary and observe your pronunciation in a enjoyable method. The sport is out there to obtain for iOS, Android and Steam.

 

Choose up on these variations within the Spanish  letras
and begin engaged on them every day.

Subsequent factor , you’ll be capable of learn most issues in Spanish.

Obtain:
This weblog publish is out there as a handy and transportable PDF that you simply
can take anyplace.
Click on right here to get a replica. (Obtain)