A Star Pattern Under the Planetarium Dome | Spanish A2
Visit a planetarium in this A2 Spanish story and discover why Orion stars can look close from Earth but lie far apart in space.
Un dibujo de estrellas bajo la cúpula
Tap any word to see its translation
. . ; , . ¡ !
, , . . , . .
, . . ¿ ? ¿ ?
Keep reading with translations
Create a free account: 7 days of Pro, then 20 word translations a day or a paid plan.
About this article
What you'll learn
space vocabulary, Solar System, planetarium, constellations, galaxies, preterite and imperfect in the same story, 15 learning cards
During a school visit, projected stars fill a planetarium dome. A guide shows how Orion looks like a pattern from Earth even though its stars can lie far apart, then briefly visits the Solar System, the Milky Way, and a simulated black hole. The A2 story practices preterite and imperfect and space vocabulary.
After reading
Article learning block
Phrases, words, grammar, and quick practice from this text.
Phrases for training
Add useful phrases to SRS or mark them as already known.
La semana pasada fui con mi clase
newLast week I went with my class
La semana pasada marks a finished moment in the past, so the verb goes in the preterite: fui, not iba.
Opens almost any story about something you did.
aprendimos muchas cosas sobre el espacio
newwe learned a lot about space
The pattern is aprender sobre algo, to learn about something. Aprendimos is the nosotros form of the preterite.
Lets you say what a trip or a lesson taught you.
El guía nos explicó que
newThe guide explained to us that it is a digital projection
Nos is the indirect object: explicar algo a alguien. Note that el guía is masculine even though it ends in -a.
The standard way to report what someone told a group.
Una de ellas, llamada Europa
newOne of them, called Europa
Ellas refers back to las lunas, so both una and llamada are feminine. With a masculine noun it becomes uno de ellos, llamado.
A short way to pick one item out of a group you just mentioned.
Me imaginé que era astronauta
newI imagined I was an astronaut
Imaginé is preterite (one moment) and era is imperfect (the scene being imagined). Spanish also drops the article before a profession: era astronauta.
The natural way to describe something you pictured.
El universo nos espera
newThe universe is waiting for us
Esperar takes its object with no preposition: nos espera. English needs for, Spanish does not.
A ready-made closing line, and a reminder that esperar needs no preposition.
Key words
Vocabulary that carries the school-day topic.
tardar
tardar
to take (an amount of time)
The pattern is tardar + time + en + infinitive: tarda ocho minutos en llegar, it takes eight minutes to arrive. The preposition is en, never para.
There is no one-word English equivalent, so learners keep translating it wrong.
la galaxia
la galaxia
galaxy
Feminine: la galaxia, las galaxias. Ours is la Vía Láctea, the Milky Way, and both words carry a written accent.
Core word of the topic, and a good reminder about written accents.
la constelación
la constelación
constellation
The written accent disappears in the plural: la constelación but las constelaciones. In Spanish the three stars of the belt of Orión are popularly called las Tres Marías.
Shows the -ción plural rule and gives you a real Spanish name for the sky.
el agujero negro
el agujero negro
black hole
Agujero is an everyday word for hole: there are agujeros in a sock too. The adjective follows the noun: agujero negro, never negro agujero.
Everyday noun plus the normal Spanish adjective order.
el atardecer
el atardecer
sunset, late afternoon
Built from tarde, afternoon. Atardecer is both a verb and the noun for that time of day, and al atardecer means at sunset.
Places an event in the day without giving a clock time.
Grammar in context
Patterns from the text worth noticing after reading.
Preterite or imperfect?
entramos / estaba, vimos / era
entramos / estaba, vimos / era
The preterite moves the story forward (entramos, vimos, salimos); the imperfect paints the background it happens against (estaba oscuro, era como estar fuera). Both are past, and Spanish makes you choose.
The hardest single choice in the Spanish past, and this text puts the two side by side.
Ser: what something is
Mercurio es el planeta más cercano al Sol
Mercurio es el planeta más cercano al Sol
Ser states what something is or what it is like as a rule: es el planeta más cercano, es gigante. Compare estaba oscuro, where estar marks a passing state.
Ser and estar split one English verb in two; this is the ser half.
Tener: what something has
Júpiter tiene muchas lunas
Júpiter tiene muchas lunas
Tener says what something has: tiene muchas lunas, tiene anillos. The two verbs work side by side in one sentence: es gigante y tiene muchas lunas.
Separates describing a thing (ser) from listing its parts (tener).
Adjective agreement
anillos hermosos, estrellas brillantes, galaxias lejanas
anillos hermosos, estrellas brillantes, galaxias lejanas
The adjective copies the gender and number of its noun: anillos hermosos (masculine plural), galaxias lejanas (feminine plural). Adjectives ending in -e, like brillantes, change only for number.
Miss this and every sentence you write sounds wrong to a native ear.
Read a book in Spanish
All A2 books
Comments
Log in to leave a comment
LoginNo comments yet. Be the first!