Problem in spanish with Ud/-s commands

Question

I am doing Ud. Uds. Command and the worksheet asks us to make a sentence using what is given. The example given is:

(todas) escuchar bien/ al medico

escuchenlo bien.

now how do you do this problem into a sentence?:

(todos) tomarse/la temperatura

can i add "lo" like on the top example to the problem?

please help me work out this problem as well, i have no idea what I'm doing. thanks

what do you mean by "can i add 'lo' on the top example? - eliesegamez95, Jan 6, 2011

on the teacher's example it uses "lo" as a direct pronoun. so i was wondering if because there is a "se" at the end of tomarse, if you could also add "lo" - lmadi, Jan 6, 2011

Answer 1

Short answer, yes, it's similar to the first example. The complication is that the second example uses a reflexive verb, so you have to attach the reflexive pronoun to the end of the command. In this case you have a direct object pronoun (la, for la temperatura), and it has to be attached to the end of the verb also. The rule is that in this case it goes:

imperative + reflexive pronoun + direct object pronoun

All one word.

Answer 2

The verb tomar is in it's infinitive form. Since the problem is using commands for usted and ustedes forms of the verb, you need to know what is the ustedes form of the verb tomar.

The command form of a verb is an imperative, and it has a slightly different form. For example, the normal ustedes form of tomar is toman (present tense indicative). If you'll look somewhere in your textbook, you'll see that the imperative form is exactly the same, except for a minor change in the ending of the verb, and it will probably tell you what that change is. I'll tell you this much, the ending for ar verbs changes to the same ending as normal er verbs when used as an imperative. So, instead of toman, you now have tom_n. Add the reflexive se, then create yourself a cute sentence with la temperatura. I hope this helps.