Preterite Tense Review

Preterite Tense Review

by Phoebe Hart

​What is the Preterite Tense?

• ​A past tense in Spanish (1 of 2)

• ​Used for:

  • ​Completed actions in the past (as in it is no longer ongoing or was not habitual in the past)

  • ​Things with a clear start or end, even if it's not explicitly stated as a time.

Multiple Choice

¿Cuál es un uso correcto para el pretérito?

• To describe the setting of a story

• To talk about completed actions in the past

• To tell someone what you want to do in the future

• To talk about things happening now

​Let's elaborate on "completed actions"...

​You won't always know exactly what time something started or finished.

​

​BUT you can probably infer whether it is "completed" by considering the following questions:

• ​Is this a description, or ongoing state in the past? NOT a complete action

• ​Is this something that was done repeatedly or habitually in the past? NOT a complete action

• ​Is this something that started at one singular point, and ended at another point? Even if you don't know exactly when those were, that IS a completed action.

Multiple Choice

"Acciones completos" significa...

• Actions that used to be done, or were ongoing, in the past.

• Actions that are ongoing right now.

• Actions that have been completed, with clear start or end points

• Actions in the past without a clear start or end, like descriptions

​Context, context, context!

​You NEED to recognize the context of sentences to know if they make sense. This means studying vocabulary!

​

​For example, you might infer that someone who says, "I already did my homework" did that homework at a specific time and it is a completed action in the past.

​

​However, if you don't know your Spanish vocabulary, "Ya hice mi tarea" won't make any sense to you.

Multiple Choice

"Ya hice mi tarea" is a good use of the preterite tense.

• True

• False

Multiple Choice

"De niña, fui a la casa de mis abuelos todo el tiempo," is a good use of the preterite tense.

• True

• False

​"De niña, fui a la casa de mis abuelos todo el tiempo" is NOT a good use of preterite. Why?

• ​Phrases like "De niña" mean something like "in my childhood" or "as a little girl" - phrases like this usually don't signify a specific action, but rather something you did habitually as a child.

• ​"Todo el tiempo" suggests that going to my grandparents house was something I did repeatedly - all the time. That isn't a complete action, because we don't have any clear idea when it started or ended.

• ​You can infer that this is not a completed action in the past.

Multiple Choice

"En 2008, fui a la casa de mis abuelos para dos semanas en el verano" is a good use of the preterite tense.

• True

• False

​"En 2008, fui a la casa de mis abuelos para dos semanas en el verano" IS a good use of the preterite. Why?

• ​Even though we don't know specific dates, we know that this trip had a clear start and end.

• It only lasted two weeks, and then was completed.

• ​This is describing a singular trip to my grandparents house, not a repeated action or habit in the past. Therefore, it is complete and a good use of the preterite.

Multiple Choice

Choose the sentence that is the best use of the preterite tense.

• El año pasado, mi familia pasó mas tiempo juntos.

• En el pasado, practiqué el fútbol americano.

• En escuela primaria, fui al club de arte todos los días.

• Ayer, fui a practica después de escuela.

​Let's talk about those choices!

• ​El año pasado, mi familia pasó mas tiempo juntos.

  • ​This one doesn't really have a clear start or end- it just happened last year at some point. And you can infer that your family did this habitually or repeatedly, because spending more time together suggests that it didn't just happen once. This is NOT a complete action.

• ​En el pasado, practiqué el fútbol americano.

  • ​This one also is too vague - we don't know what the clear start or end would be, and to say that you did this in the general "past" suggests that it happened repeatedly or for a while, which means it is not a singular completed action.

​​

• ​En escuela primaria, fui al club de arte todos los días.

  • ​Again, saying "todos los días" suggests that this was a repeated ro habitual action in the past. You did this multiple times, so we don't know when this started or ended. It just happened "in elementary school. This is not a completed action in the past.

• ​Ayer, fui a practica después de escuela.

  • ​This one suggests that practice started and ended yesterday. It has a clear start and end, we know when it happened specifically, and it is done now. This is a singular, completed action, so it was the best option for using the preterite tense.

Multiple Choice

Paying attention to both the use of preterite tense, and the correct conjugations, choose the correct way to say the following: I spoke with my mom yesterday.

• Hablé con mi mamá ayer.

• Hablo con mi mamá ayer.

• Hablaba con mi mamá ayer.

• Hablamos con mi mamá ayer.

Multiple Choice

Paying attention to both the use of preterite tense, and the correct conjugations, choose the correct way to say the following: In class today, we learned about the preterite tense.

• En clase hoy, aprendo del pretérito.

• En clase hoy, aprendemos del pretérito.

• En clase hoy, aprendimos del pretérito.

• En clase hoy, aprendí del pretérito.

Multiple Choice

(Skipping vostoros) Which set of endings is correct for regular AR verbs in the preterite?

• -o, -as, -a, -amos, -an

• -í, -iste, -ió, -imos, -ieron

• -é, -aste, -ó, -amos, -aron

• --o, -es, -e, -imos, -en

Multiple Choice

(Skipping vostoros) Which set of endings is correct for regular ER/IR verbs in the preterite?

• -o, -as, -a, -amos, -an

• -í, -iste, -ió, -imos, -ieron

• -é, -aste, -ó, -amos, -aron

• --o, -es, -e, -imos, -en

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Keep practicing until you feel confident. SpanishDict is a great resource to check conjugations. ​

Don't forget irregulars and stem changers!

​Check your notes and make sure you know how to work with those, too. We'll do a practice activity for that soon!