El Patio Spanish Language School

Direct object pronouns are confusing at first!

In English we hardly think about our uses of: me, you, it, her, him, us, them. When forced to identify the right pronoun to use at the right time, students of the Spanish language often get lost quickly!

Keep in mind that pronouns are here to make your life easier. How frustrating and tedious would it be name objects or people every time you mention them? Look at the following example:

John threw the ball to Maria. While the ball was still in the air, Maria caught the ball. Then Maria threw the ball back to John.

How repetitive! Look how much easier it is when you fall in love with pronouns:

John threw the ball to Maria. While it was still in the air, she caught it. Then, threw it back to him.

"No Ball Games" by Banksy

A pronoun is a word that replaces a noun – a direct object pronoun is the pronoun used to replace the noun receiving the action of the verb.

Maria hides the dirt.

Maria hides it.

The action part relates to the verb: in the example above the verb is to hide. The dirt receives the action of the hiding - the dirt did not hide her! She hid the dirt! So in this case we know: we need to use a direct object pronoun to replace the word dirt!

"Sweep it Under the Carpet" by Banksy

Still following? It gets easier from here!

To replace the word dirt in English, we use it. If she were hiding several dirty dishes we would say: she hides them. Spanish too has a variety of direct object pronouns for different situations:

me (me) nos (us)

te (you (familiar))  os (you-all (familiar))

lo / la (him, it / her, it / you (formal) los, las (them (objects or people), you-all (formal))

Pretty simple?!

"Rainbow Rain" By Banksy

The part that trips students up is where to place the pesky things in a sentence!

In affirmative sentences with one simple verb, the direct object pronoun comes before the conjugated verb:

Maria hides the dirt.

María esconde la suciedad.

María la esconde.

When using two verbs, you have two options in where to place the direct object pronoun: immediately before the conjugated verb or attached to the end of the infinitive (besar) or the present participle (besando).

Okay… You've lost me

Again, don’t panic about grammatical terms (though good on you if you caught all that!) Once you see it a few times, the IDEA will make sense, even if the grammar doesn’t!

John can kiss Paul.

John lo puede besar or John puede besarlo.

John is kissing Paul.

John lo está besando or John está besándolo*

*(Notice the accent on the á in besándolo? This is simply to retain the stress where it was before you put on the pronoun at the end!)

Many English speakers choose the later option as it translates much better from English – John is kissing him (rather than: John him is kissing).

Pronouns are one of those topics that simply take loads of practice making plenty of mistakes along the way! Take a general direct object pronoun quiz here. Then get more specific and work on their placement here.

In Summary ...

Remember where the Direct Object Pronoun is placed:

Directly before the conjugated verb
Attached to the end of these verb forms:
- Infinitive (–AR, –ER, –IR)
- Present Participle (gerundio: –ando, –iendo)
- Command (more advanced)