Preterite Vs. Imperfect, Life Lessons (Spanish Past Tense)

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The preterite Vs. the imperfect... not easy.

The last video was the "up-in-the-sky, aerial" view.

This video is the "nitty, gritty, in-the-trenches" view.

In the last video, I gave you a "rule of thumb" for choosing between the preterite and the imperfect.

In this video, I'm giving you real life examples from the TV show "Orange is the New Black".

This is minute-for-minute, one of the most educational videos I've made so far.

Here's a comment I just received today on YouTube:

"Big thank you for this video. I've watched countless videos on preterite v imperfect and these REAL

WORLD examples nailed it! Also, the dash of humor you bring to the table is great. Thank you."

--the_renegade_ryan (YouTube)

Watch this video!

Even if you already have the preterite/imperfect down pretty well, you'll still learn a thing or two.

I sure learned a lot making it.

Other past tense videos:

[KellyODo]

OMG, this was life changing for me: Preterite = What Happened, Imperfect = How Things Were. Thank you! I wish I could have conceptualized this sooner.

[ericascag]

Oh my goodness, you are SO much better than any spanish class I've ever taken! I can actually understand what you are saying in a simple "dumbed down" manner. You are saving me from my Spanish II final!

[scottlarson]

This video is a much better explanation than the many videos I've seen on YouTube. Teachers in these videos have filled their whiteboards with strangely specific examples (games, parties, birthdays, jobs, wars) but never really give an explanation as to why each example falls into each tense. It's like they're saying, "Hey, we figured this out. You should be able to figure it out too." After using the two cases for a few months it now feels in my brain like imperfect is a blurry, background kind of past tense while the preterite is a focused "point your finger at it" kind of past tense. Yesterday someone asked about something i was doing yesterday and I said, "Estaba soleado." The weather was in the background of what I was doing so my brain chose imperfect.

[BetweentheBeans]

This is one of the hardest things that we've learned in Spanish yet, and I thank you for making it far clearer than our textbook. My Spanish teacher prefers your videos to how the book describes imperfect as well!

[Cat-wtdh]

I am a Spanish tutor and I appreciate that you put in the time and effort to make these (accurate) videos - I am always recommending them to students! *thumbs up*

[lovedanceever]

Dude your videos completely turned on to learning Spanish! I used to hate it and didn't understand it at all but because of your videos and your passion for the language I made it my minor in college! Your technique of using what we already know from English to translate into our understanding of Spanish is absolutely KEY. Learning from native speakers is essential as well but having an English speaker, like yourself, has cleared up so many things that I could never quite get. Awesome content and thank you!!

[SelenDere]

when u learn something in the space of 18 minutes that ur teacher tried teaching u for a year.

[ryanlatone]

Big thank you for this video. I have watched countless videos on preterite v imperfect and these REAL WORLD examples nailed it! Also, the dash of humor you bring to the table is great. Thank you.

[allareznikov]

I love your Spanish lessons .I can stadying all day
It is the bast Spanish classes i have ever taken.And very easy to follow. Thank you

[teresamullen]

Thank you so much for all of these videos! I am a 37 year old returning college student and my degree requires 6 semesters of language and 4 in one ( I chose Spanish as I live in Texas). I was never great at learning language, possibly because I never took school seriously until my 30's, but it has been the most challenging class. Even though I have been passing with A's, its almost as if I understand the formula without knowing why I am or how it works. I constantly email my professor for help (online course) and she refers me to various different websites, but I still leave confused and irritated. Thank you SO much for making these videos that "dumb it down". I hate the term, but it's true. I can write you a paragraph or fill in a blank, but when hearing Spanish spoken around town, completely at a loss. These videos are so amazing and cut down to the basics and why. Keep up the great work! I will be working all summer at perfecting what I have learned so far before beginning Spanish III, and plan to watch every video you have made. Thank you, from a girl trying so hard to learn and understand.

[ZackSussmanMusic]

I really love your Spanish lessons, and I have learned a lot from them XD :D, but I was just wondering - do you purposefully edit your videos so that you never blink?

[emilianom]

Something that has worked for is to see if it can be continuous i dont know if it is just luck but so far it has worked for me

[raprein]

God this is funny, thank you for the humor you give us while practising this complicated stuff! True teacher

[chrisbld]

After looking at the example text my teacher gave me to translate, and listening to your video in the background, it finally clicked. Your repetition of things really helps as it means I don't have to rewind the video constantly. Thank you so much for the help, keep doing what you're doing :D

[OrlandoOspinoSanchez]

Preterite is confusing even for me (I'm a native speaker)

[malazkarar]

I'll just say that even when i don't feel like studying spanish, one video from you is enough to pump me up to give a 100% !! Perhaps your spirit is contagious 💗

[sneakyrifle]

when u got a 70 on a Spanish test on preterite and imperfect since the teacher cant teach and u search online for clarification and u saw this...







Fuck me, i wished i saw this earlier since this is way clearer than what the spanish teacher was teaching, thanks jordan

[andialternative]

I started watching your videos a week ago and after watching many of your videos this is one of your best videos so far in my opinion! Thank you!!

[samuelliaw]

Your lessons are so amazing! I like the way you explain, although I’m not a native English speaker but what I always do is exactly comparing Spanish with English, feeling every Spanish words have relative counterpart of English does help me understanding its structure a lot! Thanks!

[leonardocaldas]

Tú haces que el español sea fácil, explicas perfectamente como utilizar el pretérito perfecto simple del pretérito imperfecto. Saludos desde Paraguay