Contents Lesson 1: To Be To Be Summary Vocabulary Exercises Lesson 2: Articles and Gender Articles Gender Summary Vocabulary Exercises Lesson

Lesson 3: Formal Pronouns, Possessive Adjectives and Plural Nouns Formal Pronouns Possessive Adjectives Plural Nouns Vocabulary Exercises Lesson 4: Regular Verbs and Negation Regular Verbs Negation Vocabulary Exercises Lesson 5: Adjectives, Adverbs, and Questions Adjectives Adverbs Questions Vocabulary Exercises

Part One - The Basics

Lesson 1: To Be
Welcome to the Portuguese course here at UniLang. We want to help you learn foreign languages and we hope this little course can help. Of course we also have a big grammar reference and a list of vocabulary available for you to study. These courses in part one are intended for absolute beginners who need a little assistance with starting to learn some basics, so this is not a complete course. When we've showed you the most important basics we'll let go you and then you can explore our grammar reference all by yourself. Before you continue you must do two things. First of all, make sure you are familiar with all the basic grammar terms, do you know what a noun is? What a verb is? What an adverb is? The second thing you should do is learn how to pronounce things in Portuguese. To Be We'll start by teaching you how to introduce yourself in Portuguese, take a look at the following Portuguese sentence and its English translation. All Portuguese text will be written in blue and the English translation in green. "Eu sou o Roberto" "I am Roberto" Here we see your very first Portuguese sentence where you introduce yourself as Roberto, a fictional person, you should of course replace the name with your own name. Although the sentence consists of only four words we are going to carefully examine each word. The first word "Eu" is the Portuguese equivalent of the English word "I", also referred to as 1st person singular, it's a subject pronoun. The second word "sou" is a verb, it's a conjugation of the irregular Portuguese verb "ser", which is one of the two Portuguese equivalents of "to be". Note that in Portuguese the subject pronoun is optional, it's usually omitted. So you could also say: "Sou o Roberto", because the verb "sou" already indicates that it is "I" who's saying it. So remember, only use a subject pronoun such as "Eu" when you really want to imply that it's absolutely that person who's doing something."O" is the masculine definite article "The" and it is always required before nouns.

Now we've seen how to introduce yourself using "sou" but we can also introduce other people. Take a look at the following examples. We've put the subject pronouns between brackets because they are usually omitted: (Eu) Sou o Roberto. (Tu) s o Roberto. (Ele) o Roberto. (Ela) a Roberta. o Roberto. (Ns) Somos o Roberto e o Paul. (Vs) Sois o Roberto e o Paul. (Eles / Elas) So o Roberto e o Paul. I am Roberto. You are Roberto. He is Roberto. She is Roberta. It is Roberto. We are Roberto and Paul. You are Roberto and Paul. They are Roberto and Paul.

Those are a lot of new words! But it's all very easy. There are also two other pronouns "Voc" and "Vocs", which are respectively formal singular treatment and informal plural treatment. They use the 3rd person verb forms. Now you've seen all subject pronouns in Portuguese, which are usually omitted, and you know how to refer to people. And besides that you've also learned your first Portuguese verb, an irregular verb: "Ser", in English "To be". There is also a small new word that appeared in this lesson, the Portuguese word "e", which means "and". Also note that there are two forms for "they" in Portuguese. You can say "eles" or "elas". "elas" is used when referring to a group of females. "eles" is used when referring to a group of men or a mixed group. "A" is the feminine equivalent of "O", placed before feminine nouns. Summary In this lesson you've learned two aspects of Portuguese grammar, you've learned the subject pronouns and you've learned the full conjugation of the irregular Portuguese verb "ser". Vocabulary We'll ask you to study a number of words in each lesson , this time we'll give you a couple of very easy words to study, learn them in both directions! English-Portuguese and PortugueseEnglish.

Vocabulary
pai me av av father mother grandmother grandfather

Exercises Each lesson will come with some exercises so you can practice the grammar and vocabulary of this lesson. In these exercises we ask you to write the subject pronoun between brackets so you learn those too. In the next lessons you can omit the subject pronoun.

Exercise A: Translate to English: 1) (Ele) o Roberto. 2) o pai. 3) (Eles) So o Roberto e o Ral. 4) Ela a me. 5) (Tu) s a av. 6) (Vocs) So o Joo e o Jos. 7) (Ns) Somos o George e o William. Exercise B: Translate to Portuguese: 1) We are James and Jane. 2) You are the fathers. 3) I am the mother. 4) She is the grandmother. 5) They are Roberto and Ral. 6) You are George and William. 7) You are the grandfather. Solutions After you've done the exercises you can check whether your answer is correct using the following solutions: Solution of Exercise A: 1) He is Roberto. 2) He is the father OR It is the father. 3) They are Roberto and Ral. 4) She is the mother. 5) You are the grandmother. 6) You are Joo and Jos. 7) We are George and William. Solution of Exercise B: 1) (Ns) somos o James e a Jane. 2) (Vocs) so os pais / (Vs) sois os pais. 3) (Eu) Sou me. 4) (Ela) a av. 5) (Eles) so o Roberto e o Ral. 6) (Vocs) So o George e o William / (Vs) sois o George e o William. 7) (Tu) s o av.

Lesson 2: Articles and Gender

Articles Apparently you've successfully finished lesson one, so now we can continue with the second lesson. In this lesson you'll learn how to describe certain objects. First of all we are going to teach you articles. You've already learnt about "O" and "A" but there's more to it. Take a look at these Portuguese sentences:

Ele um pai. Ele o pai. Ele o av. Ela a me. a cadeira. uma cadeira. uma casa. a casa.

He is a father. He is the father. He is the grandfather. She is the mother. It is the chair. It is a chair. It is a house. It is the house.

Here we see a whole mix of words. We see "o" an "a" as a translation of "the" and "um" and "uma" as a translation of "a" and "an". But how come there are two translations? Of course they're both right, otherwise we wouldn't show them to you. But how can it be possible that the word "the" and "a and an" have two translations in Portuguese? This has to do with the difficult concept of noun gender, a concept not known in English but that appears in almost every other language. In most other languages a noun has a certain gender. So you're telling me a noun can be a boy or a girl? Indeed...that's what we're saying. A noun has a certain gender. In Portuguese (and many other Latin languages) there are two genders: masculine and feminine. Every noun has one of these two genders. How to determine what gender a noun has isn't usually hard, and can be explained using a number of guidelines: - Nouns ending in -O are usually masculine. - Nouns ending in -A are usually feminine - Nouns ending in -MA are masculine - Nouns ending in DADE, TUDE and many ending in O are feminine - Others ending on a consonant are usually masculine NOTE: There are of course several exceptions. When in doubt check a dictionary. Gender Most grammar rules are dependent of the gender of the noun, so you'll have to learn the gender of each noun. One grammar rule that is gender-dependent is the translation of the articles "the, a and an". When the noun to which the article applies is a masculine noun then "the" is translated as "o". If the article applies to a feminine noun then the article that has to be used is "a" . Note that "o" and "a" are only used with singular nouns, When the noun is plural you use "os" for masculine nouns and "as" for feminine nouns. This also applies to the indefinite article ("a and an"). In Portuguese you use "um" when the noun is masculine and singular and "uma" when it's feminine and singular. In Portuguese there also exists a plural indefinite article. While we in English can't say ("a houses and a tables"), in Portuguese this is possible. You can use "uns" for masculine nouns and "umas" for feminine nouns. This could translate as "some" or "a couple of" in English. Well, this noun gender concept might have confused you a bit. For English speaking people it can be a weird concept. But if English is not your native language then it's most likely that you are already familiar with noun gender. From now on we will also mention the article of a noun in our vocabulary lists.

In this lesson we'll also introduce another irregular Portuguese verb, the verb "ter", which means "to have" . Take a look at the full conjugation and translation of this verb: Tenho Tens Tem Temos Tendes Tm I have You have He/she/it has We have You have They have

Now you've learned a new verb, memorize it. Summary In this lesson you've learned the concept of noun gender, what articles to use and you've learned another irregular verb. Vocabulary Learn the following words, the words of the previous lesson are mentioned again, but this time we also show what definite article to use.

Vocabulary
o pai a me a av o av a cadeira a casa a mesa o gato o co o osso o animal o edifcio the father the mother the grandmother the grandfather the chair the house the table the cat the dog the bone the animal the building

Exercises Exercise A: Translate to English: 1) Um gato um animal. 2) A casa um edifcio. 3) O co tem um osso. 4) Tenho um gato. 5) O pai tem uma casa. 6) O pai e a me tm um co. 7) Vocs tm uma casa.

Exercise B: Translate to Portuguese: 1) The grandmother has a cat. 2) A cat is an animal. 3) The table has a chair. 4) The grandmother and the grandfather have a dog. 5) The mother has a dog and the father has a cat. 6) We have a table. 7) They have the house. Solutions Solution of Exercise A: 1) A cat is an animal. 2) The house is a building. 3) The dog has a bone. 4) I have a cat. 5) The father has a house. 6) The father and the mother have a dog. 7) You have a house. Solution of Exercise B: 1) A av tem um gato. 2) Um gato um animal. 3) A mesa tem uma cadeira. 4) A av e o av tm um co. 5) A me tem um co e o pai tem um gato. 6) Temos uma mesa. 7) Eles tm a casa.

Lesson 3: Formal Pronouns, Possessive Adjectives and Plural Nouns

Formal Pronouns Before we teach you how to tell that something belongs to a certain person we first have to teach you how to be polite in Portuguese (We've mentioned it briefly in lesson 1). In Portuguese and most other languages, but not in English, there exists a certain polite form of "you". In Portuguese they say "Voc" instead of "tu" in formal speech. "tu" is only used among friends, people of the same age and for children. In most parts of Brazil, though, "tu" is almost never used, and "voc" is used in almost all situations. Verbs after "Voc" are also conjugated differently, like a 3rd person singular ("ele"). Take a look at the following sample sentences, and note that the subject pronoun is usually omitted, but for this example we haven't omitted it: Tu s a av. Voc a av. Tu tens um co. Voc tem um co. You are grandmother. You are grandmother. You have a dog. You have a dog.

And this same construction also applies to the plural form of "you", instead of "vs" they use "vocs", which is both the formal and informal pronoun in colloquial speech. Also note that in Brazil, "tu" and "vs" are almost never used. Possessive Adjectives Now that you know how to be polite, we'll continue with indicating possession. We're gonna teach you the so-called "possessive pronouns" or "possessive adjectives". At the same time you'll learn how translate "this" and "that" (demonstrative pronouns). Notice that in Portuguese there are 3 levels of distance: "This", which is close to the person who's speaking, "That" which is close to the person you're speaking to, and "That" which is away from both the intervenients. Here are a couple of new sentences: Essa/Aquela a minha cadeira. Esta a tua cadeira. Essa/Aquela a sua cadeira. Essa/Aquela a sua cadeira. Esta a sua cadeira. Essa/Aquela a nossa cadeira. Esse/Aquele o nosso co. Esta a vossa cadeira. Este o vosso co. Esse/Aquele a sua cadeira. Esta cadeira Esta casa Este co Este gato Essa/Aquela cadeira Essa/Aquela casa Esse/Aquele perro Esse/Aquele gato That is my chair. This is your chair. That is your chair. (This is the polite/formal form, singular and plural) That is his chair. This is her chair. That is our chair. That is our dog. This is your chair. This is your dog. That is their chair. This chair This house This dog This cat That chair That house That dog That cat

You've learned a couple of things now. You can use "this" and "that" independently (separated by the verb "to be").You can use them adjectively. The forms are "este" ("this") and "esse/aquele" ("that") with masculine nouns, and "esta" ("this") and "essa/aquela" ("that") with feminine nouns. You've also seen the possessive adjectives and you probably noticed that possessive adjectives also have a formal form for both the singular and the plural "you". Note that the both the possessive adjectives ("meu, teu, seu/sua, nosso, etc") AND the demonstrative pronouns (" esse, esta, etc..") get an extra S when the noun they apply to is a plural noun. And you probably also noticed that there is a masculine and a feminine form of "our" and "your (plural)". With masculine nouns you use "nosso" and "vosso" and with feminine nouns you use "nossa" and "vossa". Notice also that when you refer to his/her, it's not the gender of the person that matters, but the gender of the thing possessed. Plural Nouns

Now it's time to learn plural nouns. Until now you've only seen singular nouns such as "house" and "chair", but now we'll teach you how to form a plural noun ("houses", "chairs") in Portuguese. Forming a plural noun in Portuguese is not the easiest thing. If the word ends in a vowel or diphthong add -s, if it ends in the consonants r, n, s or z add -es. If it ends in -m, the ending changes to -ns, words ending in -al, -oi, -ul change to -ais, -ois, -uis, words ending in -el or -ol change to -is, -is, words ending in a stress -il change to -s, words ending in a unstressed -il change to -eis. Words ending in -x and some ending in -s don't change at all. Words ending in -o can change to -os, -es or -es (we'll show it on the vocabulary lists from now on). Some examples: "Livro - Livros, Universidade - Universidades, Sal - Sais" Now we'll teach you one last thing in this lesson. You have to know that in Portuguese the word order is very flexible and it often occurs that the subject of the sentence appears at the end of the sentence. An example of two sentences that are exactly the same, except for the word order: A tua me tem as chaves Your mother has the keys As chaves tem a tua me Your mother has the keys You see the flexible word other. Get used to it because it frequently occurs that the subject appears at the end of a sentence or is after the verb, not necessarily at the end of a sentence. The demonstrative pronouns, demonstrative adjectives and possessive adjectives we've just discussed also have plural forms. So when a plural noun is involved, you need to make it plural. This is simply done by adding an S to the singular form. I think this has been enough material for this third lesson.

Vocabulary
o livro o cavalo o rio o olho o macaco o rato a chave o dedo a torre o crculo a fotografia a cmara aqui ali muito muitos the book the horse the river the eye the monkey the mouse the key the finger the tower the circle the photo the camera here there much *used with singular masculine nouns many *used with plural masculine nouns

muita muitas

much *used with singular feminine nouns many *used with plural feminine nouns

Exercises Exercise A: Translate to English: 1) Essas so as minhas fotografias. 2) Um macaco tem dedos. 3) Estas so as vossas chaves. 4) Isto um rato. 5) Tenho muitos cavalos. 6) Tens a nossa cmara. 7) Ela tem a tua chave. 8) Estas so as vossas torres. 9) Ela tem estes livros? 10) Temos essas cmaras. Exercise B: Translate to Portuguese: 1) We have many fingers. 2) These are my eyes. 3) That is his key. 4) This is your book and these are your dogs. (spoken to a stranger) 5) I have those photos. 6) Her books have photos. 7) They have the house. 8) This house is your house.(spoken to a dear friend) 9) You are their grandmother.(use formal speech) 10) He has this camera. 11) The houses have many keys. Solutions Solution of Exercise A: 1) Those are my photos. 2) A monkey has fingers. 3) These are their keys. 4) This is a mouse. 5) I have many horses. 6) You have our camera. 7) She has your key. 8) These are your towers. 9) She has these books. 10) We have those cameras. Solution of Exercise B: (Note that the subject may also be placed at the end of the sentence) 1) Temos muitos dedos. 2) Estes so os meus olhos. 3) Essa a sua chave.

4) Este o seu livro e estes so os seus ces. 5) Tenho estas fotografias. 6) Os seus livros tm fotografias. 7) Vocs tm a casa. 8) Esta casa a tua casa. 9) a vossa av. 10) Ele Tem esta cmara. 11) As casas tm muitas chaves.

Lesson 4: Regular Verbs and Negation

You've already worked your way through three chapters, make sure you understood everything that appeared in those chapters, make sure you understand the grammar and vocabulary and do make the exercises to practice. Also make sure you try to pronounce every Portuguese sentence so you can practice your pronunciation. Regular Verbs Let's start now by learning a regular Portuguese verb: "falar" ("to speak" in English). In Portuguese a regular verb in the present tense always has the same ending. That ending is underlined in the following example. There are three groups of regular verbs in Portuguese, "falar", and all other infinitive verbs that end in AR, belong to the first group. The part of the verb that's not underlined is called the stem, the part of the verb that always remains the same. The stem can be obtained by removing the last to characters of the infinitive verb (AR, ER or IR). There is however one special verb (and its derivate verbs) that ends in OR, but it is irregular. Falo Falas Fala Falamos Falais Falam I speak You speak He/She/It speaks" *also applies to the formal form of "you": "voc" We speak You speak They speak" *also applies to the other form of "you": "vocs"

It's pretty easy to understand. Each person has it's own ending. The endings you just saw are valid for all regular verbs that end in AR. There are two other groups. The ER group (for all regular verbs that end in ER) and the IR group (for all regular verbs that end in IR). An example of the ER group using the verb "comer", meaning "to eat" Como Comes Come Comemos Comeis Comem I eat You eat" He/She/It eats" *also applies to the formal form of "you": "voc" We eat You eat They eat" *also applies to the form of "you": "vocs"

An example of the IR group, using the verb "abrir", meaning "to open". This group is very similar to the conjugations of the ER group. Abro Abres Abre Abrimos Abris Abrem I live You live" He/She/It lives" *also applies to the formal form of "you": "voc" We live You live They live" *also applies to the form of "you": "vocs"

This was pretty clear I think, you should memorize the ending of each person for each of the three groups. Negation Now we're going to talk about negation, because you might want to say: "That is NOT a house", "and that is NO dog". In Portuguese "no" is translated as "no". It appears directly before the main verb. I think that's enough material for now, make sure you understand it. It's quite hard. So don't hesitate to reread this lesson a couple of times. Vocabulary Learn the following words, from now on there will also be regular verbs (or at least verbs that are regular in the present tense) in the list.

Vocabulary
falar comer viver amar correr ver o rapaz o homem a mulher a ma a rvore portugus ingls to speak to eat to live to love to run to see the child/the boy the man the woman the apple the tree Portuguese English

Exercises

Exercise A: Translate to English: 1) Vejo as fotografias. 2) O homem corre. 3) O rapaz come uma ma. 4) As mulheres no vem a rvore. 5) No vejo rvores. 6) No tem cavalos. 7) O rapaz come muito. 8) Comemos muitas mas. 9) Estes no so animais. 10) A mulher no v. 11) Falas portugus. 12) Falam ingls. Exercise B: Translate to Portuguese: 1) I see a tree. 2) You do not see this. 3) We speak Portuguese. 4) I have no children. 5) She sees an apple. 6) This isn't her grandfather. 7) You speak Portuguese. 8) They see my house. 9) He sees that tree. 10) I am not Portuguese. 11) We do not have those keys. Solutions Solution of Exercise A: 1) I see the photos. 2) The man runs. 3) The child eats an apple. 4) The women don't see the tree. 5) I don't see any trees. 6) He doesn't have horses OR She doesn't have horses OR You don't have horses 7) The child/the boy eats much. 8) We eat many apples. 9) These are no animals. 10) The woman doesn't see. 11) You speak Portuguese. 12) They speak English. Solution of Exercise B: 1) Vejo uma rvore 2) No vs isto OR No v isto OR No vem isto 3) Falamos portugus 4) No tenho rapazes. 5) (Ela) v uma ma 6) Este no o seu av 7) Fala portugus OR Falas portugus OR Falam portuguse 8) Vem a minha casa

9) V aquela rvore 10) No sou portugus OR No sou portuguesa(if the speaker is female) 11) No temos essas chaves

Lesson 5: Adjectives, Adverbs, and Questions

After the difficult lesson you've just done we'll make things a little easier. In this lesson we'll teach you how to use adjectives in Portuguese. I suppose you already know what an adjective is. Adjectives An adjective tells something about a noun, it describes a property of a noun. It usually appears next to the noun, although it can also be separated from the noun using the verb "ser" (in English: "to be"), note that in such a construction the "independent" adjective is never a direct object! A casa grande. O rapaz jovem. A mulher velha. As mas so vermelhas. The house is big. The child is young. The woman is old. The apples are red.

This is an easy construction, the Portuguese adjective is never conjugated in any way in such a construction. You only have to make sure that the adjective agrees in gender and number with the noun. The same rules for making the plural of nouns applies to the plural of adjectives. There are some exceptions but we won't go through those now. Of course an adjective usually appears next to the noun (in Portuguese usually after the noun) instead of being separated by "ser". A casa grande O rapaz jovem A mulher velha As mas vermelhas Adverbs Now we can move on to the matter of adverbs. An adverb can be compared to an adjective but instead it says something about a verb instead of a noun. It's easy to form an adverb in Portuguese. Just use the feminine form of the adjective and add MENTE. Ele corre rapidamente Falo lentamente Fala fluentemente He runs fast I speak slowly He/She/It speaks fluently The big house The young child The old woman The red apples

Now you also know how to form adverbs, it's really easy. Of course there are also irregular adverbs, a good example would be "good" in Portuguese: "bem". Questions

We can continue with asking question in Portuguese, to tell things is nice, but once in a while you might need to ask something to someone. We'll teach you. The word order in a Portuguese question is almost the same as in English, although in English we use the helper verb "do", in Portuguese there's no such helper verb. Where in English we'd use "do" the Portuguese use the real main verb, in the correct conjugation that matches with the subject. Some questions: Qual a tua casa? Onde estamos? Quando vem? Quem este homem velho? Que vs? Que vemos? Que v? What is your house? Where are we? When does he come? Who is that old man? What do you see? What do we see? What does he see?

Also remember that the Portuguese don't use a helper verb such as "do". Instead of it they use their main verb in the correct conjugation. You've also seen some interrogative pronouns now (the words used to ask question: such as: "what?" etc...). One strange thing is that you see two words for "what", there are two variant, you can say either "que" or "qual". The first one when asking about facts and such, the second one lies closer to our word "which", it describes an option, a choice, one of more possibilities. This concludes the fifth lesson. Vocabulary Learn the following words, from now on there will also appears adjectives and adverbs in the list (as well as interrogative pronouns in this lesson).

Vocabulary
andar nadar rpido lento velho jovem bom alto mau agradvel amvel novo a bicicleta que? qual? quem? to walk to swim fast slow oud young good high bad nice kind new the bike which? what? who?

qual? porqu? quando? quanto? quantos? muito

which? why? when? how much how many very

Exercises Exercise A: Translate to English: 1) Este homem um homem amvel. 2) Quem esse rapaz amvel? 3) Quando comemos? 4) Que isso? (=neutral form of esse/essa) 5) A casa grande a nossa casa. 6) Ela corre rapidamente. 7) A minha velha av muito amvel. 8) A minha bicicleta nova. 9) Estes animais so muito agradveis. 10) Que vs? Exercise B: Translate to Portuguese: 1) I see a new chair. 2) The old woman sees an apple. 3) Who are you? 4) She is not old. 5) They walk fast. 6) Our grandmother is an old woman. 7) These children are young. 8) The young child sees a high table. 9) What does the bad dog see? 10) Why doesn't the kind cat see? Solutions Solution of Exercise A: 1) This man is a kind man. 2) Who is that kind child. 3) When do we eat? 4) What is that? 5) The big house is our house. 6) She runs fast. 7) My old grandmother is very kind. 8) My bike is new. 9) These are very nice animals. 10) What do you see? Solution of exercise B: 1) Vejo uma cadeira nova.

2) A mulher velha v uma ma. 3) Quem s? OR Quem (voc)? 4) No velha (ela). 5) Andam rapidamente. 6) A nossa av uma mulher velha. 7) Estes rapazes so jovens. 8) O rapaz jovem v uma mesa alta. 9) Quem v o co mau? 10) Porque no v o gato amvel?

End Of Part One

This is the end of part one. Now you've learned some of the basics of the Portuguese language. In the future we might create a part two of this course but for now this is all. However, we do have a lot more information on Portuguese grammar available for you on the UniLang site! And now you know some basics you will probably manage to learn more with other aids.