Spanish alphabet

As I said before the first step to become fluent in Spanish is know the “abecedario”, that is not that hard, as the written letter you probably know from your own languages, you would need to practice the pronunciation, but once you get it, that would be you, not double sounds, you will be a step closer to communicate in Spanish, the only one you might not be familiar with, it would be the letter  ñ, that is the typical Spanish but since is in the word España, I bet you have seen quite often.

 

Spanish alphabet sounds.

Yeah, alphabet letters seen but you can not actually make up how they sound can you?At the moment you can see the same letter you know, I attached how they should sound and a video, to make it easier.

A                        B                   C                      D                      E                   F

Ah                    beh,             she                   deh                  eh                  eh-feh

 

G                       H                   I                           J                    K                      L

Heh                ah-cheh         ee                    hoh-tah             kah                  eh-leh,

 

M                       N                   Ñ                     O                     P                     Q

eh-meh           eh-neh           eh-nyeh        oh                    peh                 koo,

 

R                         S                   T                   U                     V                       W

eh-reh              eh-she          the                oo                   beh              oo-bleh-doubleh

X                           Y                                      Z

eh-kees          ee gryeh-gah                 theh-tah

 

 

Spanish peculiar sounds

Also I have said all the letters sound the same once you know them, the mix of the letters can vary slightly, I attached as well a list of this sound changes and a word in english when you use that sound, so you can built a link.

A——is like the sound in English cat

E                                                  pen

I                                                    meet

O                                                  pot

U                                                  cool

 

C when it is followed by I or E      theatre, thead, try to say this Spanish words cine(cinema) and  cero (zero)

but when C is followed by A/O/U  the sound is like the c in cone  try saying Casa(house), coche(car) cuatro (four)

CH    is the sound chocolate    , try with noche (night)

G       is a funny one when it has the letters E or I after would be loch try gimnasio(gym)

with A/O/U  is the g in go, say gato(cat) or guapo( handsome)

if we have Gu followed by E or I it will be the gu in guild, try sayng guerra(war) or guia (guide)

The letter H never has sound, like the one in honest , the same in Spanish for hueco( gap)

LL    would be the same as only , say llave(key)

Ñ is similar to the sound of ni on onion, say españa

Qu is a tricky one, and confuses a lot of people but  it sounds like kit, try queso(cheese)

Z is the equivalent of th on thick, try saying zoo, do not forget that zoo, it would say z o o in Spanish not as in English

I hope I had not discourage you to learn Spanish, I promise you it is easier when you practice out loud 🙂

 

 

And…do not forget…practice makes perfection so practice..practice…practice!A good game to do so it grab a friend and play hang man!

I also leave you the link to the youtube channel so you can actually hear the sounds, that always helps 🙂 .