Welcome to Vol. 72 of
the Spanish Online Newsletter! Part of the Spanish
Learning Blog - your weekly lessons with mp3 files, as well
as links to Spanish travel spots and more.
I'm sorry that September turned out to be too hectic
for me to write the newsletters - I was traveling a lot, which
made it difficult. Too much work, too little time :) Also, work
on the Spanish Verb Visualizer is continuing - my dear programmers
Mahasweta and Rajat have worked hard to help iron out the kinks
- and the demo version isn't far off.
Modal Verbs - Using 2 Verbs Together
Very often in Spanish you'll find 2 verbs used
together, in combinations. The first verb will be conjugated,
whereas the 2nd verb remains in the infinitive form. For anyone
trying to translate literally from English this can seem confusing!
Look at the following example:
No puedo nadar
At first glance, it looks like the sentence is
saying "I can't to swim" - when in reality
it says "I can't swim". When verbs are used in modal
verb combinations - the 2nd verb is not conjugated, but rather
left in the infinitive form. You would never say "no puedo nado".
There are several key verbs used often as modal
verbs - and it's a good idea to practice using them.
Worksheet/Activity: Spanish
Modal Verbs
Quiz: Modal
Verbs in Spanish
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