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Exercise: practise the present subjunctive of regular verbs

On this page, you'll practise making sentences using the present subjunctive of regular verbs. Remember that in our introduction to the subjunctive, we said that the subjunctive is roughly the equivalent of English "snapshot" constructions such as him doing it, for them to come etc. Holding this idea in our head, on this page we'll make some Spanish sentences with the subjunctive.

The sentences you'll make in Spanish will all have the following format:

present tense + que + present subjunctive

The "main verb", in the normal present tense, will be one of the following:

quiero, quiere... I, he/she wants...
espero, esperan... I, they are hoping...
no creo... I don't think...
no quiero... I don't want...
Feedback Suggest a change / Cambios sugeridos

Then, the second part of the sentence will be que introducing a verb in the present subjunctive. For example:

EnglishSpanish
he wants you to waitquiere que esperes
I want them to studyquiero que esudien
I'm hoping he writesespero que escriba
I don't think he'll writeno creo que escriba

Feedback Suggest a change / Cambios sugeridos

Notice that:

  • English may use a different construction, depending on the main verb. For example, in English you can say I want him to wait and I'm hoping he waits; but it's not grammatical to say I want he waits or I'm hoping him to wait.
  • On the other hand, Spanish will always use the same construction in the example sentences we'll practise here. Your Spanish sentence will always be a "normal" present tense (from the list above) plus que plus a present subjunctive form.

Reminder of subjunctive forms

Remember how to form the subjunctive in Spanish: depending on the type of verb, the endings are "the other way round" than for the regular present tense:

  • if it's an -ar verb, you add -er endings (and the yo form ends in -e);
  • if it's an -er or -ir verb, you add -ar endings (and the yo form ends in -a).

Exercise

Fill in the grid below, making a Spanish sentence to match the English one given. The sentences will all have the above formula. Click the 'vocabulary' button for the list of verbs used.

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