Informal Commands

Familiar Commands

By Pheobe Aveiga

Affirmative Tú Commands

• Reminder: Use tú with people you would address on a first-name basis.

• Affirmative commands = telling someone to do something

• To form affirmative tú commands:

  1. conjugate in the tú form in present tense

  2. remove the "s" at the end of the verb

Multiple Choice

What is the affirmative command for 'eat' in Spanish?

• comemos

• comer

• comen

• come

Multiple Choice

What is the affirmative command for 'write' in Spanish?

• come

• habla

• lee

• escribe

Multiple Choice

What is the affirmative command for 'read' in Spanish?

• leemos

• lees

• leer

• lee

Multiple Choice

What is the affirmative command for 'listen' in Spanish?

• escucha

• escuchamos

• escuchad

• escuchas

​​Irregular Affirmative tú commands

The following verbs have irregular tú commands. Notice that these verbs also all have irregular yo forms:

Decir: Di
Hacer: Haz
Ir: Ve
Poner: Pon

Salir: Sal
Ser: Sé
Tener: Ten
Venir: Ven

One way to remember these irregular commands is by remembering:
Vin Diesel Has Ten Weapons, Eh?​

​Irregular Affirmative tú commands

Negative Tú Commands

• Negative = Don't do...

• Forming a negative tú command is different than forming a positive one.

• To form a negative tú command

  1. conjugate in the present-tense "yo" form (ending in o)

  2. drop the o

  3. For -AR verbs, add -es

  4. For -ER or -IR verbs, add -as

Multiple Choice

NEGATIVE Informal Commands - Comer

• no como

• no coma

• no comas

• no come

Multiple Choice

What is the negative informal command for 'escribir'?

• No escriben

• No escriba

• No escribas

• No escribes

Negative Tú Commands

• If a verb has an irregular "yo" form in the present tense, keep those same spelling changes in the negative Tú command (but change the ending.

  • For example: No salgas (salir/yo salgo), no digas (decir/yo digo)

• Similarly, stem-changing verbs keep their present-tense stem-change in the negative Tú commands

Multiple Choice

What is the negative informal command for 'hacer'? (Yo hago)

• No haces

• No haga

• No hacen

• No hagas

Multiple Choice

What is the negative informal command for 'decir'? (Yo digo)

• No dices

• No digas

• No dicen

• No dicas

Negative Tú Commands

• Verbs that end in car, gar, or zar have a spelling change in negative tú commands

• This is the same spelling change that you saw in preterite:

  • c -> qu (sacar / no saques)

  • g -> gu (apagar / no apagues)

  • z -> c (almorzar / no almuerces)

Negative Tú Commands

• The following verbs have irregular forms in the negative Túcommands:

  • dar: no des

  • estar: no estés

  • ir: no vayas

  • saber: no sepas

  • ser: no seas

Multiple Choice

NEGATIVE Informal Commands - ser

• no sé

• no seas

• vayas

• no segas

Multiple Choice

NEGATIVE Informal Command: Don't go

• vas

• no vas

• vayas

• no vayas