1. Gender In English, nouns can be masculine, feminine, or neuter (meaning having no gender). In Spanish, however, every noun must be masculine or feminine. So, how do we know? A general rule is “if it ends in “o”, it’s masculine. If it ends in “a” it’s feminine.” For example: El colegio = the high school (The word “el” tells us that it is masculine.) La escuela = the school (The word “la” tells us that it is feminine.)

2. *As always, there are exceptions to the rule: words that end in ción, sión, tad, dad, and umbre are almost always femenine. Example: libertad, conclusión,televisión, lumbre, universidad, nación, personalidad, conversación. *Words that end in a but that come from Greek are masculine: Example: problema, sistema, idioma, tema, clima, programa, poema, telegrama.

3. Practice: Instructions: Divide the new vocabulary words and your ABC words according to the gender: Masculino: Femenino: