El alfabeto

The alphabet in Spanish takes more alphabet letters than the English alphabet does, but no worries, this lesson will walk you through all the letters and will help you learn the pronunciation of each one of them along with some grammar rules.
The Spanish alphabet used to have 29  letters, but according to the Royal Spanish Academy, the "letters" CH and LL were extracted from the alphabet in 1994. The reason why the RAE stopped counting CH and LL is because they represent the sound of two letters combined into one, just like the letter RR, and we call this "digraph".
Like in English, Spanish has five vowels. Unlike English, each vowel has only one sound that is pronounced the same in all the words.
Knowing the phonemes of the vowels will help you read words in Spanish correctly.

Vocales (vowels)

A as the A in "star".
E as the E in "test".
I is associated with the pronunciation of "ea" as in the word "Beach".
O as the O in "Obey".U is associated with the pronunciation "oo" as in the word "school".
Practice the pronunciations of the vocales with the following words:
Amar (to love), Ala (wing), Ana.Elefante (elephant), Ese (masc. sing. that), este (east).Isla (island), Inglés (English), Iglesia (church).
Consonantes (consonants).

Let's start with the easier ones.
B (beh), D (deh), P (peh), T (teh) are used exactly like in English. B as the B in "Boy", D as the D in "Diamond", P as the P in "Pet" and T as the T in"Test"
F (efeyh), M (emmeyh), N (enneyh) and S (esseyh) are also used exactly like in English.
N as the N in "noun", M as  the M in "mom" and S as the S in "salt".
H (ah cheh) Is simply not pronounced, regardless of the location of it. It could be at the beginning, middle or end of the word but it would still not be pronounced. When the letter C is accompanied by the letter H, CH (chayh) is pronounced  as the CH in the word "chin"
J (ho tah) This is pronounced like the letter "H", as  the H in the word "ham"
K (kah) as the K in "kilo".
L (eleh) as the L in the word "Land" but when it is presented in the form of "LL" this is equivalent to the pronunciation of the letter Y as in "yesterday".
V (beh) or (oo beh) Same pronunciation as the letter "b".
W (double beh) same use as in the W in English.
X (eh kees) same use as the letter X in English.  The same pronunciation applies to the digraph ''CC"
Z (sehteh) In Latin America this is pronounced exactly like the letter S, but in Spain is pronounced as the TH as in the word "math".

Now, the ones that are just a little bit more complex:
First I would like to point out that there are two types of vowels: Strong and weak vowels.Strong vowels are "A, O, U" and weak vowels are "E, I"

The letters C and G can produce two sounds depending on what type of vowels are next to them.
Strong vowels (A, O, U) after the letter C, will sound like / k / as the C in the word "car".
On the other hand, when a weak vowel (E, I) goes after the letter C the word makes the sound / s / as the s in the word "sun".
The same rule applies to the letter G. When this is continued by one of the strong vowels is pronounced as the G in the word "go" and when followed by a weak vowel this is pronounced as the H in the word "hat".
Ñ (enyeh)This is a key point in the Spanish language. It is like a normal letter N but with a little hat on called tilde. The pronunciation is very different from the letter N, this sounds as the "ny" in the word "canyon"
Q (coo)  This is basically used as the letter K. Usually when you see a word that contains Q will be accompanied by the vowels UE as in the word "que" (what/that) or the vowels UI  as in the word "quiero" (I want). The pronunciation of the vowel U in this case is omitted, the respective sound for QUE is "ke", and for QUI is "ki".
As for R (errayh), we have twosounds. As a general rule when the word starts with the letter "R" the pronunciation of the letter R is  strongly trilled, this also applies when the word contains the doble R (RR).
When the R  is in the middle of the word or at the end, the pronunciation will be soft, as the R in "paradise".
And last but not least we have the Y (ee greaehgeh) this letter also has two sounds. When Y is situated in the middle of a word, this is pronounced  as the Y in "York". When Y is by itself, representing the equivalent to the connector word "and", it is pronounced as a normal "I" in Spanish.
Practice pronunciation with the following words:
Barco (boat)
Casa (house) Cielo (sky) Chocolate, Accidente (accident)
Dorado (golden)
Fuego (fire)
Gato (cat), General
Helado (ice cream) ahora (now)
Jarra (jar)
Koala
Literatura (literature) LLuvia (rain)
Mesa (table)
Naranja (orange)
Niño (boy)
Pintura (painting)
Queso (cheese) Quinto (fith)
Radio, Corazon (heart), Amor (love), perro (dog)
Sol (sun)
Tomate (tomato)
Vaca (cow)
Ayer (yesterday)
Zanahoria (carrot)

I hope this helped you understand a little bit more about the Spanish alphabet and made you want to learn more about this beautiful language.

In addition of the lesson, you can watch my video about of the Spanish alphabet.

Persuing a dream

“Learn a new language and get a new soul”

Czech Proverb

Because each language comes with its own sentiment, telling how I feel in only one language is not longer enough.
Growing up in Paraguay for me was a constant hearing and speaking two native tongues everywhere.
I also had to learn Portuguese, besides Spanish and Guarani, if I wanted to be able to enjoy the Saturday morning cartoons. I was raised in a rural small town where except for only two Paraguayan channels, our parabolic satellite only picked up Brazilian channels. Of course I had to adjust.
After moving to the United States of America, my mind opened from door-to-door and I experienced opportunities I've never imagined.
Imagine the environment we live in, a globalized world. You can find culture of at least 5 countries in one little area. United States has many races and cultures from anywhere in the globe. I focus my services to make cross-cultural connections result easier for people.

I started teaching Spanish because of my passion of teaching languages and my desire to connect with different kind of people who share similar beliefs. 

Knowing that I can be part of  people's learning process is my incentive. I want to be the person that helps decrease language barriers. I want to help People in a way that it will be beneficial in so many ways.
Communicating  with one another is fundamental, indifferently of  race, culture, sex, religion, etc. We are all here to create new opportunities in each other's lives. I believe that learning languages is important for the relationship between us humans. Specially in the United States where is increasingly necessary to communicate and connect with different cultures in an every day basis.
The demand for learning new languages ​​is growing every day because we are in the era of globalization.
 I feel responsible as a bilingual educator to help people to reach their goals of Spanish learning.
Adding my passion for teaching to the experience of  learning English once I moved here, I knew that I could relate easily to my students because I understand the obstacles of learning a new language.
An important part of the services I provide to each of my students is focusing on the relationship between me and my students. Every person is different in their way of learning and perceiving information.
My goal as an educator is not only to  adapt accordingly to each person but also to maintain a good relationship with trust and communication in order to know how to introduce lessons and to identify the tools that will help me reflect simplicity in the classes.
Being able to speak four languages is the most valuable gift I have received from life and I am looking forward to teaching you Spanish!