Warm-up
- — Say the phrase out loud twice before reading the note.
- — Cover the target column and translate from English first.
Study & learning
A short dialogue you can say out loud, with the English underneath and a note on why the grammar works.
Warm-up
Practice dialogue
You · Buenos días, ¿cómo estás?
Good morning, how are you? — Informal 'tú' form
Partner · Quisiera una mesa para dos.
I would like a table for two. — 'Quisiera' is polite conditional
You · ¿Cuánto cuesta esto?
How much does this cost? — Costar is stem-changing: o → ue
Partner · ¿Puedes repetirlo más despacio?
Could you repeat that more slowly? — Object pronoun attaches to the infinitive
You · Todavía estoy aprendiendo, lo siento.
I am still learning, sorry. — Estar + gerund for ongoing action
Partner · ¿Dónde está la estación más cercana?
Where is the nearest station? — Superlative with 'más'
You · Buenos días, ¿cómo estás?
Good morning, how are you? — Informal 'tú' form
Partner · Quisiera una mesa para dos.
I would like a table for two. — 'Quisiera' is polite conditional
Rebuild drills
Rebuild this sentence about ordering food at a café: "Good morning, how are you?"
Answer: Buenos días, ¿cómo estás?
Rebuild this sentence about ordering food at a café: "I would like a table for two."
Answer: Quisiera una mesa para dos.
Rebuild this sentence about ordering food at a café: "How much does this cost?"
Answer: ¿Cuánto cuesta esto?
Rebuild this sentence about ordering food at a café: "Could you repeat that more slowly?"
Answer: ¿Puedes repetirlo más despacio?
Most language apps train recognition — you tap the right tile and move on. Recognition is not recall, which is why people who have finished a whole course still freeze at a counter. Saying a line out loud, badly, is the part that transfers.
Keep sessions short and repeated. Ten minutes daily against the same six structures will beat an hour on Sunday, because spacing is what moves a phrase from effortful to automatic.
The grammar notes explain why each sentence is built the way it is, so you can swap nouns and verbs confidently instead of memorising whole sentences you can never reuse.