Spanish grammar is complex and relies heavily on memorizing conjugations. Most Spanish learners find it relatively easy to understand Spanish grammar when reading or listening, but struggle to use it correctly when speaking or writing. However, with the right tools and practice, you can master Spanish grammar. I recommend learning new grammar patterns through input and practicing proper grammar through writing. You can gather input through any Spanish language resource, such as books or TV shows. When you come across a new grammar point you don’t understand, copy and paste it into Google and write “grammar” after it. For example, let’s look up “por grammar,” like in the image below. You will see several websites with grammar explanations pop up.
Here I’m using the website Story Learning. When you open the website, you will see a quick explanation of the grammar point, including meaning, how to use it, and example sentences. This is pretty standard across most grammar websites.
If you scroll down a little more, you will see more example sentences with English translations.
If you are still struggling with the grammar of a sentence, you can ask ChatGPT to explain it to you. You may have to ask a few times in different ways to get the answer you want, but you can get a grammar explanation in English or Spanish.
You can copy a few of the example sentences into your Anki deck for Spanish sentences so you can review the grammar pattern again later. If you don’t have the Spanish sentences decks downloaded or don’t know how to use Anki, you can learn more through the links below.
Remember, you should only make about 5 new cards a day, as making too many cards will burn you out. Focus on quality over quantity. You’re not missing anything by making fewer cards. If those grammar patterns are important, you’ll see them again!
For practicing grammar and sentence order, I like to use cloze cards. These are cards where a specific word or phrase is removed from a sentence, and you need to fill it back in. To create a cloze card, change your note type at the top of the card creation screen to “Cloze Spanish Sentences.” In order to have this note type, you will need to have downloaded and opened the Spanish sentences template deck.
Before clozing any sentences, it’s important to add audio first, since cloze deletions remove words, which will affect audio generation. To add audio to your card, start by copying the Spanish sentence. Then, click into the audio field where you’d like the file to go. With your cursor in the audio field, click the speaker icon in the top toolbar. If you don’t see this icon, it likely means AwesomeTTS isn’t installed. You can learn how to install it by following the article linked below.
If you copied your Spanish sentence and have it on your clipboard, it will automatically appear in the text box on the right side, otherwise, you can type out the sentence manually. To add the audio to your card, click “record.”
Now we can cloze our sentence. Start by selecting the word or phrase you want to hide, then click on the “Cloze deletion” button on the toolbar.
You can cloze as many words or phrases as you’d like in a sentence, and each cloze will generate a separate card. Some people prefer to cloze every word to practice sentence structure, one piece at a time. Personally, I only cloze key words or phrases that I think are the most important to remember. Once you’ve finished adding your clozes, click “Add” at the bottom of the screen to create the new cards.
When you study these cloze cards, you will be presented with the sentence with one of the words missing. Your goal is to recall the missing word. If you need a hint, you can click on English for the English translation of the sentence.
On the back of the card, you’ll be able to grade yourself on how well you remembered the word. You’ll also see the English translation and hear the audio.
Practicing Grammar
Learning Spanish grammar can be pretty tricky as it requires a lot of memorization. Learning through input and practicing through writing are the best ways for you to improve your Spanish. After reading or watching a grammar explanation, try writing a few sentences of your own. Personally, I need to use a grammar pattern many times before I can fully comprehend it. To check that your usage is correct, use ChatGPT or HiNative to receive feedback.
Grammar Websites
Conjuguemos
Conjuguemos is a fantastic website for learning and practicing Spanish grammar through games! It is also completely free for students and individual learners, and you can use it with or without an account! If you would like to save your process and keep track of your scores, you can register for a student account. Where it asks you to enter your username, enter your email address instead.
Once you are in, click on “library” in the upper right corner to see all available practices. Under Spanish, click on the area you would like to practice.
There are lots of fun mini-games to practice your vocabulary or conjugations!
There are also quizzes and worksheets for you to practice your grammar! What you choose to practice is up to you!
Spanish Dictionary
Spanish Dictionary has lots of great interactive grammar lessons for every level! Just choose what you want to practice! All of the practices are clear and easy to follow, with lots of exercises.
When you first start a grammar lesson, you will be given an explanation to read through, then you will do some practice to get used to using the grammar pattern. If you don’t have a main Spanish learning resource, I highly recommend Spanish Dictionary, as working your way through all the lessons in order is a complete Spanish course. However, if you already have a main learning resource, you can just do the lessons for the grammar you are weakest on.
Spanish Dictionary also has a conjugation practice tool, where you can practice verb conjugations. This is super helpful as conjugations tend to be the most difficult part of Spanish for most learners.
ProfeDeELE
ProfeDeELE is a Spanish practice website for intermediate to advanced learners. The lessons are fully in Spanish with lots of exercises to help you practice and build confidence in Spanish!
Each lesson has an overall topic and lots of exercises to help you practice. Exercises can be fill-in-the-blank, word search, word match, and more!
Hanbok Study – Freemium
Hanbok is an amazing website that lets you break down and analyze Spanish sentences piece by piece. Start by selecting Spanish as your target language, then type or paste the sentence you want to analyze into the search field. After you analyze a sentence, you will be able to go over each word one at a time and see what role it plays in the sentence, as well as its form or grammar usage.
If you scroll down a bit, you’ll see all the words in the sentence listed in their dictionary forms, along with the grammar points used, each with a level rating and example sentences.
Linguno
Linguno is another great website for practicing Spanish through games! This website has conjugation drills, listening practice, and crossword puzzles to help you improve your Spanish!
123 Teach Me
123 Teach Me is another great resource for grammar practice. It has a lot of grammar explanations and worksheets to help you practice!
Grammar Practice Books
Practice is a great way to get better at grammar, especially when it requires a lot of memorization, like Spanish. Practice books are a great way to get a complete overview of Spanish grammar if you work your way through the entire book, or they can be used as a reference for difficult grammar.
Complete Spanish Step-by-Step
Complete Spanish Step-by-Step goes over everything you need to have a strong foundation in Spanish. You can work your way through the entire book or use the glossary as a reference to find sections you would like to review.
Each section gives you an explanation of the grammar point and several practice exercises. All of the answers can be found in the back of the book.
Practice Makes Perfect – Complete Spanish
Complete Spanish is very similar to Step-by-Step Spanish but is a bit longer and more in-depth. If you are looking for a good ePUB reader to use with it, I recommend Aquile Reader.
Grammar YouTube Channels
The Language Tutor – Spanish
The Language Tutor is a great channel for learning and reviewing grammar. Danny’s explanations are clear with good examples making even the most difficult topics more comprehensible.
Spring Spanish
Spring Spanish makes videos on useful expressions, conversations, grammar, and more!
The Spanish Dude
The Spanish Dude breaks down Spanish in a way that is easy to understand. He teaches grammar in a fun and sometimes unconventional way that will help you remember what you’ve learned.
Hola Spanish
Hola Spanish is a Spanish learning channel entirely in Spanish, making it perfect for intermediate and advanced learners to review and practice grammar in a fully immersive environment!
