how can i memorize conjugation?
i am failing miserably in my Spanish class and the main focus is conjugation. how can i memorize it quicker?
8 Answers
Como decimos en México, macheteando. En inglés se dice "drilling". Repitiendo, estudiando, escribiendo y repitiendo otra vez. No hay de otra. Animo. Recuerda que el que perservera, alcanza!
If you would give us a little more information, such as what Spanish course level you at, how many or which tenses have you covered, etc., we could understand your situation better, but I know of no quick and easy way to memorize. It is like the old joke about the out-of-towner who was kind of lost in New York City and who stopped an older lady on the street and asked "How do I get to Carnegie Hall?" She replied of course, "Practice, practice, practice."
Mastering the various conjugated forms of regular verbs involves getting how they are formed down pat. For example past tense of -ar verbs are formed with the endings é, aste, ó, amos, asteis, aron. Learning the irregular verbs is just a matter of memorization I used a combination of writing several verbs in all of the conjugated forms that we covered over and over and then reading them to myself and I still had a hard time remembering them all.
I would wish you good luck in your studies but we both know luck has almost nothing to do with it.
I am not a fan of rote memorization. Verb conjugations are best memorized by using them in a context that you understand. Let's say you are now expected to know the past, present, present progressive, and imperfect tenses. First of all review how, when, and why they are used. Without that knowledge, rote memorization is meaningless, and you will continue to fail. Then take a simple sentence that is amenable to being changed into those four tenses, and is amenable to subject changes. Let's take the sentence: "Steve eats a sandwich." Make the changes and say the sentences aloud as you make the changes. Then go through the exercise again, and change the subject to "yo", "tú", "nosotros", and "ellos", again going through all the changes in your mind and saying them aloud as you mentally make the changes. If necessary, make some notes on the verbs you don't know and take a peek when necessary, but punish yourself for having to look, by going through that sequence several times until you can do it without looking. Practicing out loud, or in a whisper if necessary, is the best way to commit stuff to memory. Then make up a different sentence, which again, must be amenable to verb tense changes and subject changes. Don't stick with one sentence very long. You can put vocabulary words from your class in your created sentences and kill two birds with one stone.
Example:
Present: Esteban come un sandwich. Past: Esteban comió un sandwich. Imperfect: Esteban comía un sandwich. Present Progressive: Esteban está comiendo un sandwich.
Present: Tú comes un sandwich. Past: Tú comiste un sandwich. Imperfect: Tú comías un sandwich. Present Progressive: Tú estás comiendo un sandwich.
etc.
Add vosotros to your list of subjects, if you are required to know it, and of course "él, ella, or usted" for 3rd person singular if you aren't using "Steve" anymore.
Bottom line is that you learn a language by speaking it, and being able to do some simple mental gymnastics - making changes here and there in the sentences you are saying aloud. No matter what method of learning you choose to memorize verb conjugations, if you can't perform the above exercise rather rapidly and effortlessly, then you really haven't learned the specific conjugations you have studied.
To make this most efficient, you should be aware of what verbs you will be tested on and study those, along with any participles/gerunds you are expected to know. The best test-takers are those that are good at predicting what skills one is going to be tested on.
By the way, some people learn material very well by writing it. That's fine as a preliminary step. But again, if you can't go through the above exercise, changing verb tenses and subjects, and doing this on the fly without notes, you really haven't achieved much mastery of verb conjugations.
If rote memorization is all you're after, you should find the verb conjugation trainer at spaleon.com helpful.
As the other person (Kirk) states, without knowing what level you're in it's hard to give guideance (without making it more difficult or frustrating for you). I'm going to go out on a limb and presume you're at the beginner stage (like myself) of just learning the most common verbs like Ser/Estar, Tener and possibly a few others. The end result is you have to practice (try and find some online chat forums for beginners to help you get comfortable with writing and word usage or get get together with your class mates for some practice/study time). Below is what I did and it helped me get a better grasp on spanish verbs.
On a sheet of paper (or in word if you're doing it on a computer) start by writing out the first verb you want to tackle with the verb description next to it; then underneath and on the far left side indicate the "english conjugation" (see below for ex), then on the right hand side write out the applicable conjugated version that goes with what it is you're trying to say in the next column to the right.
For example: Tener (to have, i have, you have, he/she, we/they you all have)
I Have Tengo He/she/it + polite Tiene
Then once you've written out the conjugated list, write out different sentence structures and say them out loud as you write them (repeat as necessary) e.g.:
I have a book Tengo un libro He is hungry Tiene hambre
You'll notice I dropped the subject prounoun Yo for I and él for he/she..etc.... thsi is because it's understood to be inclucded by the conjugated form of the verb. Again, it's only be going through the various excercise in written form and orally that you will start to get it.
Repeat the above excercise for the verbs you're struggling with. Also, when I was going through some excercises where I had to conjugate verbs, after writing it out on paper I would enter the conjugated verb into the translate field using the conjugate function (see top of this site)...
Good Luck
By writing it.
By translating from Spanish to English or whatever is your native language.
Rote memorization is probably the worst way to learn, but sadly that is still the primary way people learn how to conjugate verbs.
As someone mentioned earlier, the Spaleon Verb Conjugator and other online tools are very good for learning by rote memorization. But if you have a few extra dollars to spare then you should be looking at the Verbarrator. It's the way people should be learning how to conjugate verbs in Spanish in the 21st century, well at least it is in my opinion.
The link above points to the product page, but I wrote an overview of it with screen shots and a video demo.
