Spanish Foundations and Introductions

📋 Course Outline

1. Spanish Vowel Pronunciation
2. Spanish Alphabet Sounds
3. Greetings and Farewells
4. Formal and Familiar Introductions
5. Nouns Articles and Gender
6. Countries and Numbers

📖 1. Spanish Vowel Pronunciation

★ Must-know

📌 Spanish vowels have stable, brief, pure sounds rather than changing according to English vowel patterns.

• The Spanish vowel sequence is A = “ah,” E = “eh,” I = “ee,” O = “oh,” and U = “oo.”

📌 The letter U is silent in the combinations “gue,” “gui,” and “qu,” as in queso, pronounced “keh-so.”

Further detail

📌 Spanish U is not pronounced with the “you” sound as in “uniform” unless it occurs with a y, as in ayudar.

💡 Memory Hook

A-E-I-O-U: ah, eh, ee, oh, oo

📖 2. Spanish Alphabet Sounds

★ Must-know

• The Spanish alphabet includes the distinct letters ñ, ch, ll, and rr, whose names are enye, che, e-ye, and erre.

📌 Spanish r is usually a short trilled r, almost like d, whereas rr is a long trilled r.

Further detail

• The Spanish letters q and c can represent a k-like sound, while z is pronounced like English “s” in the course examples.

• Spanish v is a soft v, almost like b, and it should not be pronounced with vibration.

💡 Memory Hook

r is short-trilled, while rr is long-trilled