Severn Spanish

Present perfect II/III

 

Introduction

Whether you know it or not, the present perfect is one of the most frequently used compound tenses in English. Whenever you say, “I have been to Peru,” or “She has already opened all of her gifts,” you are using the present perfect. In both English and Spanish, the present perfect is a compound tense formed by a helping verb (“to have,” in the present tense) and the past participle of the main verb (typically, this ends in -ed, but there are TONS of exceptions).

 

Formation

First, you need to learn how to conjugate your helping verb. And you might be thinking, “Wait. I already know how to conjugate tener.” Which is true (hopefully). But the verb you need isn’t tener. It’s haber, which is another verb that means “to have,” but in a completely different sense than tener. Haber is not used to say, “I have three monkeys in my house,” because that’s what tener is for. Haber is used to form all of the perfect tenses — yes, there is more than one perfect tense, but we will stick to the present perfect for now. Haber is a super irregular verb:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now on to the fun part: the main verb and past participles. Here’s the formula for regular past participles:

 

 

 

 

 

 

To form the present perfect, which is equivalent to saying, “I have eaten,” or “We have studied for nine hours,” just conjugate haber to fit the subject and drop in your past participle.

Examples:

Elena (comer)

Elena ha comido. (Elena has eaten.)

Jorge (estudiar por cinco horas)

Jorge ha estudiado por cinco horas. (Jorge has studied for five hours.)

nosotros (darle de comer al perro)

Nosotros le hemos dado de comer al perro.

 

Unfortunately, there are tons of irregular participles. Here are some of the most common. Look for patterns to help you remember them.

abrir — abierto

cubrir — cubierto

descubrir — descubierto

escribir — escrito

ver — visto

 

Additional notes

Direct and indirect object pronouns

As you can see in the third example above, direct and indirect object pronouns are placed before the entire verb structure—that is, they come before the helping verb. This is similar to the placement of object pronouns with the phrasal future and the progressive tenses, although with the progressives you do have the option of attaching the pronoun to the participle itself.