Conjugating verbs to present tense!
By Mina Chanakira
There are verbs in Spanish; some end in –ar, -ir, and –er
One example of these verbs is "cantar", which means to sing
But sometimes we need to use verbs in the present tense to describe what the subject of the sentence is doing
So we have to take the last two letters of the verb (–ar, -ir, or -er) and take those away from what’s left, the stem.
Ex. Cantar- to sing --> Cant ; "cant" is the stem
BUT WE CAN’T LEAVE THE VERBS LIKE THAT!
Depending on the subject, we will add either an o, as, a, an, amos or áis for the verbs that originally ended in –ar; we will insert o, es, e, en, imos, or ís for verbs that ended in –ir; and use o, es, e, en, emos, or éis for verbs that used to end in –er.
SO WHICH ENDINGS DO WE USE FOR WHICH SUBJECT ?!
Well, for all sentences that have “yo” as the subject, the present tense of the verb will end in –o.
Ex. Cantar- to sing; Yo canto- I sing
For sentences with the subject “tú”, the present verb tense will end in –as or –es, depending on what the original verb ended with (ar-, -ir, or –er)
Ex. visitar- to visit; tú visitas- You visit
Sentences with the subject “él, ella, or Ud.” will have present tense verbs that end in –a or –e.
Ex. beber- to drink; él bebe- He drinks
Sentences with “ellos, ellas, or Uds.” as the subject will have present tense verbs that end in –an or –en.
Ex. comer- to eat; ellas comen- They (f) eat
Ones with “nosotros” as the subject will use present tense verbs that end with –amos, -imos, or –emos.
Ex. decorar- to decorate; Nosotros decoramos- we decorate
If “vosotros” is the subject, the present tense verb will end with -áis, -éis, or –ís.
Ex. costar- to coast; Vosotros costáis- y'all coast