How is the present subjunctive formed?

When studying Spanish, the subjunctive can seem rather daunting, but once you crack it, it is rather simple! One thing you need to be confident with to use the subjunctive is your present verb endings.
Let's say you want to use the verb 'hablar' in the present subjunctive. The first step is to take away the -ar, so you are left with habl-. Then, you conjugate the verb with the appropriate -ER verb ending. So say you wanted to say "it is important that I speak Spanish with my family", it would look like "es importante que (yo) hable español con mi familia". As you are using the 'yo' form of the verb, habl- ends with -e.
To do it the other way round with -ER or -IR verbs, it is the exact same method, except you use the -AR verb endings. So to say "it is sad that we don't eat together", it would be 'es triste que no comamos juntos". As you can see, comemos becomes comamos because of the -AR verb ending.

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Answered by Liam C. Spanish tutor

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