Pretérito Regular Explained with Simple Animations

Welcome to our lesson on the Spanish Pretérito tense!The Pretérito is the Spanish simple past tense, used to talk about completed actions in the past.When we use the Pretérito, we're talking about actions that happened at a specific point in the past.These are specific events that have clear start and end points in the past.Let's look at some examples of the Pretérito in action.The Pretérito has four key characteristics that help us know when to use it.Let's look at the most common situations where we use the Pretérito.Now that we understand what the Pretérito is and when to use it, we're ready to learn how to form it.Regular AR verbs follow a consistent pattern. Let's see how to conjugate them in the preterite tense.To conjugate any regular AR verb, we first remove the AR ending and add new endings for each subject.For yo form, we add é to the stem.For tú form, we add aste.For él, ella, or usted, we add ó.For nosotros, we add amos.And for ellos, ellas, or ustedes, we add aron.Now let's explore -ER and -IR verbs in the pretérito. The great news is they share the same pattern!Let's look at the conjugation pattern that works for both types of verbs.Let's take the verb comer, meaning 'to eat'. We remove the -er ending and add our new endings.Here are all the forms of comer in the pretérito. Notice how each ending attaches to the stem com-.Now let's look at vivir, meaning 'to live'. Even though it's an -IR verb, it follows the exact same pattern.Here are all the forms of vivir. Notice how the endings are exactly the same as with comer.Let's review the key points about -ER and -IR verbs in the pretérito.Excellent! You've mastered both -ER and -IR verbs in the pretérito!Keep practicing these patterns and you'll be speaking in the past tense like a native!