Study GuideSpanish I–The Imperfect Tense1. Regular Verbs in the ImperfectIn Spanish, the preteritetense is used to describe actions that happened in the past. However, someverbs need spelling changes in theyo(I) form to keep the correct pronunciation. This is especiallytrue for verbs that end in-gar,-car, and-zar.1.1Verbs that end in-garIn Spanish, the lettergis pronounced differently depending on the vowel that follows it. When a verbends in-gar, thegis hard (like in “good”). But when you add-éto form theyo(I) preterite, it makesthegsound soft (like in “gym”).To keep the hardgsound, auis added between thegandé. This extraudoesn’t change how wesay the verb. For example, the verbpagar(to pay) changes topaguéin theyoform.1.2Verbs that end in-carThe lettercin Spanish can be hard (like thekin "cat") or soft (like thesin "sea"), depending on thevowel that follows. For verbs that end in-car, thecis hard in the infinitive form. However, when youadd-éto form theyopreterite, it would change thecto a soft sound.To avoid this, thecis changed toquin theyopreterite form, resulting in-qué. So,tocar(to play)becomestoquéin theyoform, pronounced like "Kay."Preview Mode
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