English UK » Spanish | 88 [eighty-eight] | Past tense of modal verbs 2

88 [ochenta y ocho] Pretérito 2

My son did not want to play with the doll.	Mi hijo no quería jugar con la muñeca.
My daughter did not want to play football / soccer (am.).	Mi hija no quería jugar al fútbol.
My wife did not want to play chess with me.	Mi esposa no quería jugar conmigo al ajedrez.
My children did not want to go for a walk.	Mis hijos no querían dar un paseo.
They did not want to tidy the room.	No querían ordenar la habitación.
They did not want to go to bed.	No querían irse a cama.
He was not allowed to eat ice cream.	Él no podía / debía comer helados.
He was not allowed to eat chocolate.	No podía / debía comer chocolate.
He was not allowed to eat sweets.	No podía / debía comer caramelos.
I was allowed to make a wish.	Pude pedir un deseo.
I was allowed to buy myself a dress.	Pude comprar un vestido.
I was allowed to take a chocolate.	Pude coger un bombón.
Were you allowed to smoke in the airplane	¿Pudiste fumar en el avión?
Were you allowed to drink beer in the hospital	¿Pudiste beber cerveza en el hospital?
Were you allowed to take the dog into the hotel	¿Pudiste llevar al perro contigo al hotel?
During the holidays the children were allowed to remain outside late.	Durante las vacaciones los niños podían estar afuera hasta tarde.
They were allowed to play in the yard for a long time.	Ellos / ellas podían jugar durante mucho rato en el patio.
They were allowed to stay up late.	Ellos / ellas podían acostarse tarde.

Babies can learn grammar rules

Children grow up very quickly. And they also learn very quickly! It has yet to be researched how children learn. Learning processes take place automatically. Children don't notice when they are learning. Nevertheless, every day they are capable of more. This also becomes clear with language. Babies can only cry in the first few months. With a few months they can say short words. Then sentences are created from those words. Eventually the children speak their native language. Unfortunately, that doesn't work in the case of adults. They need books or other material in order to learn. Only this way can they learn grammar rules, for example. Babies, however, learn grammar as early as four months old! Researchers taught German babies foreign grammar rules. In order to do this, they played Italian sentences aloud to them. These sentences contained certain syntactical structures. The babies listened to the correct sentences for about fifteen minutes. Afterwards, sentences were played for the babies again. This time, however, a few of the sentences were incorrect. While the babies listened to the sentences, their brainwaves were measured. This way the researchers could identify how the brain reacted to sentences. And the babies showed different levels of activity with the sentences! Although they had just learned them, they registered the mistakes. Naturally, babies do not understand why some sentences are wrong. They orient themselves toward phonetic patterns. But that is enough to learn a language – at least for babies…