Imperfect

1
Imperfect
2

• The imperfect, like the preterit, is a past
  tense. In English, we have one past tense.
  Spanish has two. Youll learn to use them in the
  next slide show. Here, youll learn to form the
  imperfect.
• Fortunately, the imperfect tense, unlike the
  preterit, is very easy to form.

3

• Just like you do when forming the present and the
  preterit, you drop off the ar, -er, or ir.
  Then you add the following endings
• -ar -er/-ir
• -aba -ábamos -ía -íamos
• -abas -abais -ías -íais
• -aba -aban -ía -ían
• hablaba hablábamos comía comíamos
• hablabas hablabais comías comíais
• hablaba hablaban comía comían

4

• Click here to go to a brief practice exercise.

5

• There are no stem-changing verbs or
  spell-changing verbs in the imperfect. So this
  is how you form the imperfect of the following
  verbs
• vuelve volvía pides pedías
• quieren querían piensa pensaba
• Always remember to go to the INFINITIVE and drop
  the ar, -er, and ir. If you dont remember to
  do that, youll mess up on stem-changing verbs
  and irregular verbs
• salgo salía conozco conocía pongo -- ponía

6

• There are only three irregular verbs in the
  imperfect
• ser ir ver
• era éramos iba íbamos veía veíamos
• eras erais ibas ibais veías veíais
• era eran iba iban veía veían

7

• And thats all there is to learning to form the
  imperfect. You learn the ar endings and the -er
  and ir endings, then you learn the three
  irregular verbs, and then youre done.
• Click here to go to your homework.