Reflexive Verbs

Overview

Reflexive verbs are used when the direct or indirect object of a sentence is the same as the subject. Reflexive verbs require the use of a reflexive pronoun to indicate who the subject/object is. These types of verbs are not very common in English, but are used frequently in Spanish to describe actions that a person does to, for, or from him or herself. Many verbs that express actions related to personal care or daily routines are reflexive and do not translate easily into English as "myself," "yourself," etc.

Reflexive Verbs

Reflexive verbs are made up of an infinitive and a reflexive pronoun. You can always tell which verbs are reflexive when you look them up in the infinitive form because they will have se attached to the end of the verb.

Some Common Reflexive Verbs

aburrirse (de) (to get bored with)	despertarse (to wake up)	enojarse (con) (to get mad about)	quitarse (to take off)
acordarse (de) (to remember)	destaparse (to uncover)	irse (to leave)	reponerse (to get better)
acostarse (to go to bed)	desvestirse (to get undressed)	limarse (las uñas) (to file)	secarse (to dry off)
afeitarse (to shave)	disgustarse (de) (to become upset about)	maquillarse (to put on makeup)	sentarse (to sit down)
alegrarse (de) (to be glad about)	distraerse (to distract oneself)	mirarse (to look at oneself)	sostenerse (to support)
bañarse (to bathe)	divertirse (con) (to enjoy oneself with)	olvidarse (de) (to forget about)	subirse (to get up)
cepillarse (to brush)	dormirse (to go to sleep)	peinarse (to comb one´s hair)	taparse (to cover)
convertirse (en) (to become)	ducharse (to shower)	pintarse (los labios) (to put on lipstick)	torcerse (to twist)
desayunarse (to eat breakfast)	enfermarse (to become ill)	probarse (to try on)	vestirse (to get dressed)
despedirse (to say good-bye)	enloquecerse (to go crazy)	ponerse (to put on)	volverse (to become)

Reflexive Pronouns

Reflexive pronouns have almost the same forms as indirect object pronouns except se is used in place of le and les for the third person. The reflexive pronoun will always be the same person (1st, 2nd, 3rd) and number (singular, plural) as the subject of the sentence.

Reflexive Pronouns

	Singular	Plural
1st person	me (to, for, or from myself)	nos (to, for, or from ourselves)
2nd person	te (to, for, or from yourself)	os (to, for, or from yourselves)
3rd person	se (to, for, or from himself, herself, itself, yourself)	se (to, for, or from themselves, yourselves)

Examples

Below you will find examples of how and when to use reflexive pronouns in context. In addition to an English translation for each phrase, you will see the infinitive form of the reflexive verb.

Reflexive Pronoun Placement

Reflexive pronouns are placed immediately before simple conjugated verbs and negative commands.

• Yo me saco los guantes. (sacarse) I take off my gloves.
• Tu te lavas la cara. (lavarse) You wash your face.
• Ellas se maquillan. (maquillarse) They put makeup on.
• No se escriba notas. (escribir) Don´t write notes to yourself.

Reflexive Pronouns are Attached to...

affirmative commands, gerunds, and infinitives.

• Estoy duchandóme. (ducharse) I am showering.
• Quítate el sombrero. (quitarse) Take off your hat.
• Voy a afeitarme. (afeitarse) I am going to shave.

Exercises

1) Write sentences using the subject and verb provided. Verb tense does not matter.

Example: Yo/quitarse/la bufanda. -> Yo me quito la bufanda. (I take off my scarf.)

1. Gabriela/mirarse/en el espejo.
2. Mi padre/ducharse/temprano por la mañana.
3. Yo/pintarse/los labios.
4. Tú/peinarse/el pelo.
5. ¿Estás/lavarse/las manos?

Answers

1. Gabriela se mira en el espejo.
2. Mi padre se ducha temprano por la mañana.
3. Yo me pinto los labios.
4. Tú te peinas el pelo.
5. ¿Estás lavándote las manos?

my thanks to this great article:
http://www.spanishdict.com/answers/100021/reflexive-verbs#.W8iuxflG3RY

The Eight Parts of Speech

1) Nouns

1. name…
2. a PERSON (girl, teacher, employee)
3. a PLACE (school)
4. a THING (bus, coat, pizza, job) or an IDEA (love, justice, thankfulness)
5. 2. Nouns can be common/not specific (park) or proper/specific (Baker Park).
6. 3. Nouns are who or what sentences are about (Who played ball? Jack played ball.) (What did Jack play? Jack played ball.)
7. 4. Nouns are usually SUBJECTS (Jack in the sentence above) or OBJECTS (ball in the sentence above). A subject is the one doing the action (doing the playing, above), while an object is what or who is receiving the action. SUBJECTS more often come at the beginning of a sentence and OBJECTS toward the end.

2) Pronouns

1. 1. Pronouns substitute or take the place of nouns she (the woman); his (John’s); it (the statue)
2. 2. Otherwise, sentences would sound quite funny… Julie took Julie’s umbrella to work today, and Julie’s umbrella dropped and broke! Instead… Julie took her umbrella to work today, and it dropped and broke!
3. 3. Some of the more common pronouns are I, me, mine, you, yours, he, him, his, she, her, hers, it, we, our, ours, us, they, their, theirs, them.

3) Adjectives

1. 1. Adjectives describe a noun or pronoun. Sometimes we say they MODIFY (describe) a noun or pronoun. The colorful fish swam upstream. Sam could only carry a few books because of her broken right arm. I love the gorgeous weather we’ve been having in our sunny state of Florida!
2. 2. Often, an adjective answers the following questions: what kind, how much, how many, or which one? The children had chocolate ice cream.
3. 3. Adjectives called articles include words like a, an, & the… a timeline, an apple, the answer.
4. 4. Adjectives may follow a verb such as is, seems, feels, or appears. The test seems difficult. My shirt appears dirty and torn.

4) Verbs

Verbs show action or link the subject to another word in the sentence. The police arrested the bank robber.
1. 2. Verbs are the main part of the predicate (part of the sentence telling what the subject is doing, more often in the second half of the sentence).
Eager students(subject) rushed out the school doors.(predicate)
2. 3. Verbs can be broken down into three types: ACTION (blows, screeches, takes, sings) LINKING (is, are, was, were, am, being, been, smell, look, taste, remain, feel, appear, sound, seem, become, grow, stand, turn) HELPING (shall, will, should, would, could, must, can, may, have, had, has, do, did, does)

5) Adverbs

1. 1. Adverbs describe… a VERB (Jackie left the game early.) an ADJECTIVE (That ride was scary!) or ANOTHER ADVERB (I very quietly tiptoed out.)
2. 2. Adverbs generally answer the following questions in a sentence: HOW, WHEN, WHERE, HOW OFTEN, or HOW MUCH.
3. 3. Sometimes we say that an adverb MODIFIES. That means “describes” or gives more information about.
4. 4. Many (though not all) adverbs end in ‘ly.’ (carefully, respectfully, nicely, eagerly, exactly, precisely, hungrily).
5. 5. Some negative words are adverbs, such as not, never, nowhere, rarely, hardly, barely.

6) Prepositions

Prepositions show position or direction, or can show some other relationship between nouns or pronouns in a sentence. The mouse snuck under the rug. I found my purse at the service counter.

1. 2. Prepositions always BEGIN a phrase, called a prepositional phrase, which contains a noun or pronoun, plus other modifying words.
behind the door, among the crowd, next to my house, at her party
2. 3. Common prepositions include the following (though there are many more): about between from to above before in toward across beneath of under after by off until against down on up along during over upon around except for out with at for throughout within

7) Conjunctions

1. Conjunctions CONNECT single words or groups of words/phrases. The test was long and hard! We can rest here or go a little farther. I would have gone, but I got sick.
2. 2. Think of conjunctions as links.
3. 3. Three types of conjunctions exist: coordinating, correlative, subordinate * COORDINATING connect eaual words, phrases, or clauses Robert scrubbed the floor and fell asleep. * CORRELATIVE used in pairs to connect words or groups of words (either/or, neither/nor) Either the dog obeys, or he’s gone! * SUBORDINATE introduces a clause that cannot stand alone in a sentence (known as a dependent clause) After seeing the sky, I knew it would storm.
4. 4. Here are a few sample conjunctions… and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet, either/or, as/so, after, although, as, because, if, since, so, though, unless, until, when, where, while

8) Interjections

1. 1. Interjections are words that show great emotion/feeling or surprise. They may be considered slang and are used more in conversation. Wow! Yuck!
2. 2. Interjections are usually set off by commas or exclamation marks. Hey, you’re up so early today! Yikes! That’s scary.
3. 3. Some common interjections include the following: Ah Grrr Aha Ha Aw Hey Bam Hooray Bang Oh Bummer Oh boy Cool Oh no Drats Oops Eek Ouch Gee Pop Gosh Rats Ugh Uh huh Yeah Yuck Yum Well Whack Whew Wow

my thanks to this blog post:
https://www.sophia.org/tutorials/building-blocks-of-language-the-eight-parts-of-spe

Prepositions

Prepositions are words which begin prepositional phrases.

A prepositional phrase is a group of words containing a preposition, a noun or pronoun object of the preposition, and any modifiers of the object.

A preposition sits in front of (is “pre-positioned” before) its object.

The following words are the most commonly used prepositions:

Example 1

Example 2

It is useful to locate prepositional phrases in sentences since any noun or pronoun within the prepositional phrase must be the preposition’s object and, therefore, cannot be misidentified as a verb’s direct object

Store is the object of the preposition to, not the direct object of the verb drove.


there are more examples on the below urls:




my thanks to:
https://webapps.towson.edu/ows/prepositions.htm

https://en.islcollective.com/resources/printables/worksheets_doc_docx/prepositions_-_list/prepositions-intermediate-b1/62721

Irregular Verbs

	Verb		Translation	Yo	Tú	él/ella/Ud	nosotros	vosotros	ellos/ellas/Uds
	Hacer	–	to do/to make	hago	haces	hace	hacemos	hacéis	hacen
	Tener	–	to have/to have to do something	tengo	tienes	tiene	tenemos	tenéis	tienen
	Decir	–	to say	digo	dices	dice	decimos	decís	dicen
	Saber	–	to know/to taste	sé	sabes	sabe	sabemos	sabéis	saben
	Poder	–	to be able (can, permission)	puedo	puedes	puede	podemos	podéis	pueden
	Querer	–	to want/to care about	quiero	quieres	quiere	queremos	queréis	quieren
	Ir	–	to go	voy	vas	va	vamos	vais	van
	Ver	–	to see/to watch	veo	ves	ve	vemos	veis	ven

my thanks to:
https://www.fluentu.com/blog/spanish/most-common-irregular-spanish-verbs/

Types of Pronouns

my thanks to:
http://talk2meenglish.blogspot.ie/