My Imperfect Usage Is Likely.......Imperfect.
If someone is wanting to say that a person practiced Spanish in the previous year... This would be the appropriate time time to use the imperfect, correct? What if it's in the 3rd person? Would it be:
John practicaba español.
Would there need to be some reference to a timeframe, such as "en el año pasado" or can this be excluded if it is already understood given the context of the rest of the message?
2 Answers
John aprendió español durante el año pasado. ( He learnt Spanish last year, finished with)
John ha aprendido algo de español durante el año pasado ( He has learnt a bit, ongoing, still learning, we hope)
De joven, John aprendía español. ( description in the past, imperfect)
This is not exactly an answer, because I don't know what you want to stress.
John practicó español durante el año pasado, pero ya no lo hace. ( He used to practice Spanish last year, but now he's given up, the faint-heart?)
Once you start adding specific time frames it's likely that the Preterite will be your tense of choice.
With the imperfect the sentence is often left sounding up in the air, as if more information is yet to come to complete the statement whereas the preterite has a finality to it.
Él practicó español el año pasando.
He practiced Spanish last year. (But he's not anymore.)
Él estaba prácticando español cuando yo llegué.
He was practicing Spanish when I arrived.
Él prácticaba español cuando tenía tiempo.
He used to/would practice Spanish when he had time.
