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The previous progressive refers to actions that have been going down sooner or later up to now.
For instance, in English, you’d say one thing like “The little woman was speaking to her buddy on the cellphone yesterday.”
Spanish has an identical grammatical idea.
So what’s the Spanish previous progressive, how do you kind it and when do you utilize it?
Learn on to harness the facility of the previous progressive in Spanish!
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The Previous Progressive Sample
Let’s take a look at just a few examples of the previous progressive in English and translate them into Spanish.
What have been you doing? → ¿Qué estabas haciendo?
I used to be telling her that… → Estaba diciéndole que…
She was taking a look at Sam. → Ella estaba mirando a Sam.
She was crying. → Ella estaba llorando.
Do you discover the sample within the Spanish translations?
You would possibly be capable of spot it even in case you’re new to studying Spanish and don’t acknowledge the verb endings but.
It could look difficult at first, however the Spanish previous progressive is as simple as its English counterpart. The next sections will train you tips on how to kind it, step-by-step.
The way to Kind the Spanish Previous Progressive Tense
1. Imperfect tense of estar
In case you’re studying the previous progressive tense, you’re in all probability already aware of the Spanish current progressive. If not, I like to recommend you assessment the current progressive in Spanish earlier than you proceed.
As you realize, when forming the Spanish current progressive tense, you must take the current tense of the verb estar (to be).
To kind the previous progressive, it’s good to conjugate the imperfect tense of the identical verb in response to its corresponding Spanish pronoun:
The verb estar is common within the imperfect tense, so this shouldn’t be troublesome to study.
2. Gerundio
Subsequent, we’d like the Spanish gerundio
(gerund).
Relying on the ending of the infinitive, common verbs can fall into certainly one of two teams: people who finish in -ar and people who finish in -er or -ir.
Infinitives ending in -ar
Take away -ar and add -ando:
Infinitives ending in -er and -ir
Take away -er or -ir and add -iendo:
As for irregular verbs, it will be exterior the scope of this submit to incorporate all of the attainable irregularities and infinitives. Yow will discover an extended record of irregular gerundios at Be taught a Language.
Listed below are only a few of the commonest irregulars:
3. The previous progressive: estar + gerundio
Now that we all know tips on how to get the completely different elements of the previous progressive, the one factor we’ve to do is put them collectively and make sentences.
Take a look at some examples:
Straightforward! As you possibly can see, the English and the Spanish previous progressive tenses are fairly comparable.
To raised perceive this tense, you possibly can hear native audio system use it in genuine Spanish movies with interactive subtitles on the FluentU language studying program. As you watch and pay attention to those tenses in motion, you’ll turn into extra accustomed to how the Spanish previous progressive ought to sound. You can even hear extra about it on this podcast from Information in Sluggish Spanish.
However when are you supposed to make use of this tense in Spanish?
When to Use the Spanish Previous Progressive Tense
To explain one thing that was taking place
Use the Spanish previous progressive tense whenever you wish to speak about what was taking place up to now.
Check out the next examples and take note of the similarities between each languages:
In case you’re considering that these sentences sound slightly bizarre, as if one thing have been lacking from them, I agree with you.
It’s widespread to seek out these sorts of examples when studying the previous progressive, however for a Spanish native speaker (and even for audio system of English), one thing isn’t fairly proper.
To put an motion in time
The weirdness I discussed above may be simply solved in case you add a time expression to the sentences.
Time expressions range relying on the day, yr and even particular instances. It could be unimaginable so as to add all of them right here, so let me offer you some examples as an alternative:
You’ll be able to even combine them collectively:
If we add a few of these time expressions to our examples above, we get:
Don’t you suppose they sound a lot better now? I definitely do!
To talk of an motion that was interrupted
Lastly, you’ll find the previous progressive in sentences describing actions interrupted by one other motion.
This additionally occurs in English, however whereas English makes use of the previous progressive and the previous easy, Spanish makes use of the previous progressive and the preterite tense. The interrupting motion is highlighted in daring within the examples under:
The Distinction Between the Imperfect and the Previous Progressive
Lots of people combine up the Spanish imperfect and the previous progressive. Whereas it’s true that they’re comparable (the previous progressive makes use of the imperfect tense of estar) and sometimes have similar translations in English, there’s a slight distinction between them.
Studying how and when to make use of the suitable one of many two will certainly enable you enhance your Spanish dialog and writing abilities.
Right here’s a fast and simple information to deciding which tense it’s best to use:
1. Use the imperfect tense for habits and actions that occurred over an prolonged time frame, with or with out pause:
Comía en casa de abuela cada domingo.
(I used to eat at grandma’s home every Sunday.)
Estudiaba inglés porque quería ser profesor.
(I would research/used to check English as a result of I needed to be a professor.)
2. Use the previous progressive for an ongoing motion in particular conditions that passed off at a selected second in time:
Estaba comiendo en casa de abuela ayer a las dos de la tarde.
(Yesterday at 2 p.m., I was consuming at grandma’s home.)
Estaba estudiando inglés porque mañana tengo un examen.
(I was learning English as a result of I’ve an examination tomorrow.)
With this submit, you have to be able to rock your Spanish to the subsequent degree. Do not forget that the previous progressive is simple and really helpful, so attempt to use it as a lot as you possibly can when speaking or writing in Spanish. Don’t neglect so as to add estar to your sentences, or else they are going to sound actually bizarre!
And as all the time, glad studying!
Obtain:
This weblog submit is accessible as a handy and transportable PDF that you simply
can take anyplace.
Click on right here to get a replica. (Obtain)
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