Clase de Español - The Spanish Class

Awesome Facts ● There are officially 27 letters in the Spanish alphabet! It is almost exactly like its English counterpart, except that it has the extra letter “ñ” (enyay). However, many years ago children were taught a version of the Spanish alphabet that included 30 letters. The extra 3 are highlighted in blue. The reason I have included them in the chart is because some of

But before that, let’s have some fun with these two trabalenguas/tongue twisters in order to see that the “y and “ll” letters make the same sound and to learn that

the single “r” is “soft” and the double “rr” is “hard”: ● the books you may find in Guyana may still include this older version and, most importantly, I believe it will help you know the difference between the pronunciation of words that contain either one “l” or double l (“ll”), one “r” or double r (“rr”), or “c” and “ch.”

If you can master the pronunciation of the double r (“rr”) sound in Spanish, you can easily pass as a native speaker! This sound is made by placing the tip of your tongue a little distance behind your top front teeth and expelling air as hard as you can until the tip of your tongue vibrates, making the “rr” sound.

A sole letter “y” in a Spanish sentence translates to “and” in English. In this sense, it is pronounced as (ee), like the English letter “e.” When it is part of a word, however, it is pronounced as the English “y.” Even more interesting is that in some Spanish countries when “y’ is at the beginning of a word, it is pronounced as an English “j”. For example, Yo no sé (yo no say)/ I don’t know, could also be pronounced as “joe no say.”

All the letters in Spanish are feminine—and that is the introduction to next week’s lesson!

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Hoy ya es ayer y ayer ya es hoy. Ya llegó el día, y hoy es hoy. (ohy yah es ah-yer ee ah-yer es ohy). (Ya yaygo ehl di-ya ee ohy es ohy) Today is already yesterday and yesterday is already today. The day has arrived and today is today.

El perro de Rosa Rosales lloraba por la mañana. (Ehl pay-rrow day Rrow-sah Rro-sah-lays yo-ra-ba po-r la man-ya-na) Rosa Rosales’ dog cried in the morning.

Have fun rolling those “rs” this week and I hope you join us again next Sunday!