Irregular Verbs I

All of the following verbs are irregular. Some are just a little irregular, and some are REALLY irregular. In each paradigm—that’s the chart that looks like this:

____ ____

____ ____

____ ____

--the irregularities in each verb form are highlighted so that you can see what they are. That way you know what to MEMORIZE.

IR (to go) “Ir” looks very different from its verb forms, so I’d have

to highlight every single verb form. But look at “hablar,” and you’ll see that once you get past the “yo” form of “ir,” it doesn’t look so strange:

voy vamos hablo hablamos

vas vais hablas habláis

va van habla hablan

After you get past the “yo” form, the other forms of “ir” are just a “v” with the –ar endings on it.

TENER (to have)tengo tenemostienes tenéistiene tienen

The next verb’s changes are identical to those of “tener”:

VENIR (to come)

vengo venimosvienes venísviene vienen

Just remember that “tener” is an –er verb with –er endings and that “venir” is an –ir verb with –ir endings.

HACER (to do, to make) &

VER (to see)

“Hacer” and “ver” are similar in that both are irregular in only the “yo” form:

hagohacemos veo vemos

haces hacéis ves veis

hacehacen ve ven

ESTAR (to be) “Estar” is irregular only in the first person,

except for the fact that it has accent marks where regular verbs don’t:

estoy estamos hablo hablamos

estás estáis hablas habláis

está están habla hablan

OK, two of the previous verbs come with their own little usage problems. How do you think you say, “I’m going to read”?

Voy leer.

Wrong. It’s “Voy a leer.” Any time an infinitive (a verb meaning “to read,” “to write,” etc.) follows a form of “ir,” it has to have “a” in front of it:

Juan y yo vamos a estudiar. -- Juan and I are going to study.Elisa y Carlos van a comer las manzanas.—Elisa & Carlos are going to eat

the apples.

a

“Tener” has a similar requirement.

How do you think you’d say, “I have to read”?

Tengo

Wrong. Any time an infinitive (a verb meaning “to read,” “to write,” etc.) follows a form of “tener,” it has to have “que” in front of it:

Juan y yo tenemos que estudiar. -- Juan and I have to study.Elisa y Carlos tienen que comer las manzanas.—Elisa & Carlos have to eat

the apples.

leer.

que

To sum up, here are all the irregular verbs you’ve just seen:

ir tener venir

voy vamos

vas vais

va van

hacer ver estar

hago hacemos veo vemos estoy estamos

haces hacéis ves veis estás estáis

hace hacen ve ven está están

tengo tenemostienes tenéistiene tienen

vengo venimosvienes venísviene vienen

And that’s it.

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