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This page is informative and fun.

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Did you know that gustar is not the most common 'verb like gustar'?

Before I tell you what the most common verb in this category is, I'll explain the question a little further and how I discovered the answer.

Spanish verbs can be grouped into 3 basic structures: normal, reflexive and 'verbs like gustar '.

It seems a shame that this third category doesn't have a better name. But, nonetheless, this verb structure is extremely useful and will be the focus of the rest of the post.
As an aside, this verb category likely gets its English name due to 'gustar' being the most commonly used verb to introduce this topic in Spanish classrooms.
So how do 'verbs like gustar ' work?

How to form 'verbs like gustar'

At first look, the structure of these verbs appears strange but we actually have this sentence structure in English.

Two examples in English would be:

It occurred to me...

The idea seems strange to me...

In Spanish the structure is no different. All you have to do is mentally switch the action of the verb onto yourself (or whoever is receiving the action of the verb).

A few examples with gustar:
English: I like the movie.
English: I don't like cheese.
Literal translation: To me cheese is not pleasing.
Español: No me gusta el queso. Literal translation: The movie is pleasing to me (or more specifically 'to me the movie is pleasing').
Español: Me gusta la película.
If you want to apply these verbs to someone other than yourself, you need to use one of the following 'indirect object pronouns':

Here are a few examples with these indirect objects pronouns in action:

For more details on how to use this verb structure refer back to podcast episode #7 - 'How To Use Verbs Like Gustar To Express Your Ideas'. In that episode I go into a lot more depth on how to use these types of verbs.

The importance of high frequency

One of the guiding principles of Real Fast Spanish is that you should learn high frequency words ahead of low frequency words. That's not to say you should ignore low frequency words altogether but what you should do is make a strategic effort to learn high frequency words deliberately.

Moreover, this principle is used as a filter for decision making. It means that when you are first starting out there are hundreds of words you could learn but you can reduce the mental load and increase your ability to communicate more effectively by focusing on the most useful words first.

The reason that this idea is so important is because it speeds up the rate of reaching a conversational level of Spanish.

In this post, I'm going to continue with this guiding principle and provide the most frequently occurring verbs that behave like gustar.

How I determined the most common verbs like gustar

While researching this post I looked high and low to see if a ranking of 'verbs like gustar' had already been done somewhere on the internet.

I looked to the search engines, I looked to frequency studies I have used in the past, I looked in forums and I looked in a few books on the subject of Spanish word frequency.

In the end, I couldn't find what I was looking for.

One of the biggest problems with frequency studies is that often they don't take conjugation into consideration.

For example, in a typical frequency study the words quiero and queries count as two occurrences of the verb querer as opposed to one occurrence for two separate words. This approach makes it difficult to figure out the order of frequency for a specific verb structure such as the subject of this post.
As a matter of interest, the highest occurring 3-gram in English is 'I don't' or 'I do not'. In the data they still counted the contraction of 'do' and 'not' as two sequential words.
So what I decided to do was go about finding the most common 'verbs like gustar' by reviewing the data with the help of a person who has dedicated a career to data analysis- mi novia.

We used a set of data known as ' n-grams ' for the Spanish language.

Put simply, an 'n-gram' is a sequence of 'n' words in any given language. For example, the phrase or sequence of words 'I love you' is a 3-gram in English. And this 3-gram 'I love you' occurs more often than the 3-gram 'I love baskets' or a more random 3-gram 'red high curve'.

Said in another way, the study of 'n-grams' is the study of the occurrence of sequences of words as opposed to individual words on their own.

The next step in determining the frequency of 'verbs like gustar' was to look for '2-grams' in Spanish with an indirect object pronoun (me, te, le, nos etc.) in secession with a verb in the present 3rd person singular or 3rd person plural conjugations.

We then had to remove '2-grams' such as ' me dice' which means ' he says to me' because it doesn't follow the structure we are looking for: ' it ___ to me'. Once we removed these '2-grams', we were left with the set of verbs we were looking for.

We later reviewed the data for past imperfect and past preterite conjugations to make sure the list doesn't change drastically for different verb tenses.

The results: the most commonly occurring verbs like gustar

The results of the data analysis showed the most commonly occurring 'verbs like gustar' in Spanish in order are:

A few notes on the results:

Parecer is actually the most common 'verb like gustar' if you only use the data for the present tense.

Dar is the most common when you include past conjugations.

1. Dar - to give
So in the next section I will give a few examples to reflect the occurrence of these tenses.
2. Gustar - to like 3. Hacer - to do
How to use these verbs in a Spanish sentence
4. Parecer - to seem 5. Ir - to go 6. Permitir - to permit / allow 7. Interesar - to interest English: It doesn't interest me to go to the beach today.
8. Quedar - to remain Español: No me interesa ir a la playa hoy. 9. Pasar - to pass
This section is the most important part of this post because it's where you put all of the above information into action.
10. Llamar - to call English: What catches your attention in this book?
11. Ocurrir - to occur Español: ¿Qué te llama la atención de este libro? 12. Importar - to be important 13. Dejar - to leave English: This story leaves me with some questions.
14. Llevar - to take Español: Esta historia me deja con algunas preguntas. 15. Poner - to put
Choose a number of these examples and work through them for yourself. Create your own sentences then try them out in your next Spanish conversation.
16. Faltar - to be missing 17. Tocar - to touch 18. Costar - to cost English: What costs you the most to learn Spanish?.19. Venir - to come 20. Encantar - to love Español: ¿Qué es lo que te cuesta más aprender del español? 21. Ofrecer - to offer English: This weekend offers me an opportunity to relax. 22. Servir - to serve 23. Llegar - to arrive English: If a difficult time comes, remember your dream. 24. Resultar - to result English: I still find it difficult to believe his story. 25. Preocupar - to worry
Español: Todavía me resulta difícil creer su historia.
Español: Si te llega un momento difícil, recuerda tu sueño.
Español: E ste fin de semana me ofrece la oportunidad de relajarme.
You can learn about other uses of the Spanish verb dar here.

Learn about other uses of the Spanish verb hacer here.

Learn about other uses of the Spanish verb quedar here.

Learn about other uses of the Spanish verb pasar here.

Ocurrir and pasar are almost completely interchangeable when they are used in this structure. The only difference is that ocurrir is slightly more formal.

Learn about other uses of the Spanish verb llevar here.

Learn about other uses of the Spanish verb poner here.

When you love something or someone in a non-romantic way use this verb.

Verbs like gustar - Practice quiz

To test your knowledge of everything you have read above about verbs like gustar, I have written a practice quiz.

The quiz will help you practice constructions and conjugations with the verbs from the top 25 list.

You can access practice quiz by clicking on the image on the right, or this link:

Practice quiz: Click here to test your knowledge of 'Verbs Like Gustar'.

Summary

'Verbs like gustar' is a great topic to focus your Spanish studies on. And with this post, you now have list of verbs that are essential to know, practice and use.

The best thing about this verb structure is you only have to know the conjugations for the 3rd person singular and the 3rd person plural.

My challenge to you is:

1. Choose five verbs from the list that you haven't used or seen yet.

2. Learn the present, past imperfect and preterite conjugations in the 3rd person for these verbs.

3. Use them as often as you can for the next two weeks.

Once you have these verbs covered, come back and choose another five and go again. ¡ Te viene bien saber estos verbos muy bien!

What sentences can you create using 'verbs like '?

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Did you know that gustar is not the most common 'verb like gustar'? Before I tell you what the most common verb in this category is, I'll explain the question a little further and how I discovered the answer. Spanish verbs can be grouped into 3 basic structures: normal, reflexive and 'verbs like gustar '.

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This video is very interactive. It is an extremely informative video and she demonstrates what she is doing or talking about. I also love how she is excited to explain gustar.

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Betsy, I remember learning some of these songs in middle school!

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For me, reading with good examples is the best way to understand and learn.  I just posted a question asking about the difference between querer and gustar and just by searching to complete this task, I found my answer here:

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1. The written lesson is below.

2. Links to quizzes, tests, etc. are to the left.

This is a good time to discuss the verb "gustar" because using it requires use of the IO pronouns.

In English, the following sentences are correct:

I like the room.
We like the books.

Examine the same sentences more closely.

I like the room.
I = subject of sentence
like = verb
the room = direct object
We like the books.
We = subject of sentence
like = verb
the books = direct object

In English, it is correct to construct a sentence that has the subject "liking" a direct object. In Spanish, this never occurs. In Spanish, a different construction is used.

The first thing you need to notice is that both versions really mean the same thing. They are merely different expressions of the same idea.

Idea: My feelings with regard to the book are positive.

The second thing to notice is that in English, the subject of the sentence is the person (I, we) while in Spanish the subject of the sentence is the object (room, books).

Finally notice that while the English sentence has a direct object, the Spanish sentence has an indirect object.

The room is pleasing to me.
me = Indirect Object

I like the room.
room = Direct Object

Let's study the following example:

Me gustan los libros.

Notice that gustar is conjugated as "gustan" not "gusto." A common mistake is to say "Me gusto los libros." This is incorrect because the subject of the sentence is "los libros" even though it comes at the end. Remember, the verb is conjugated to agree with the subject of the sentence.

Me gustan los libros. (I like the books.)

Notice that the conjugation of gustar changes to "gusta" when the subject of the sentence is singular.

Me gusta el libro. (I like the book.)

Since the subject of the sentence must be either singular (book) or plural (books), the only forms of gustar you will use are "gusta" and "gustan." This is true regardless of what IO pronoun appears in the sentence.

Remember, gustar becomes either gusta or gustan, depending upon whether the subject of the sentence is singular or plural. It has nothing to do with which IO pronoun is used.

Subject is singular - use gusta
Me gusta el libro.
Te gusta el libro.
Subject is plural - use gustan
Me gustan los libros.
Te gustan los libros.

Remember, the IO pronoun is not the subject of the sentence!

Here are some examples of the correct use of gustar. Notice that the only forms of gustar that appear are gusta and gustan, even though each of the IO pronouns is used.

Look more closely at one example:

Le gusta la silla.

It is impossible to tell whether this means:

1. He likes the chair.

2. She likes the chair.

3. You (usted) like the chair.

For purposes of clarification, the sentence will often begin with a prepositional phrase that clarifies just who the IO pronoun refers to.

As you can see, by adding a prepositional phrase, we remove the ambiguity of the "le" form.

You can also use a prepositional phrase to add emphasis, even if there is no ambiguity.

1. A Juan le gusta el café.
John likes coffee.

2. A mí me gusta el té.
I like tea.

In the first example, "a Juan" clarifies the ambiguous pronoun "le." In the second example, there is no ambiguity. "Me gusta el té" can only mean "I like tea." In this case, "a mí" adds emphasis, drawing attention to the fact that tea is what I like (as contrasted with what Juan likes).

Another way to look at it:

John likes coffee. Me, I like tea.
A Juan le gusta el café. A mí me gusta el té.

Now that you know how to correctly use the verb gustar, here is a list of verbs that operate in the same manner:

The practice exercises focus on 5 useful verbs:

Note that all of the other verbs listed above behave in the same fashion as the five practice verbs.

Let's add a flashcard for the special verb "gustar":

To "like" something

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The written lesson is below. Links to quizzes, tests, etc. are to the left. This is a good time to discuss the verb "gustar" because using it requires use of the IO pronouns. In English, the following sentences are correct: I like the room. We like the books.

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Ok, these are a bit hokey, but I find the more hokey they are the easier they are to remember! There are three songs. The first one is really good for practicing the "a mi me gusta/a mi tambien" combination' the second song doesn't have much but it does have a line that repeats "a todos los ninos les gustan  + verb"; the third video practices the combination of "no le gusta(n) / me gusta(n).

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One of the first things kids learn in Spanish class is me gusta. Logically, they equate the structure with I like, but that logic trips them up for years! It takes lots of exposure and practice to internalize the correct structure of the verb. Even when kids conjugate the verb to match the correct subject, you will hear them say yo instead of a mí. The structure of gustar needs to sink into their brains over time. Music is great for this kind of exposure.

Songs have tremendous power to expose learners to correct grammar structures. Best of all, kids repeat them over and over as they sing. With preschool and elementary students, I choose songs based on thematic units, but I am also aware of the grammar points they are learning. I try to include songs with gustar on a regular basis. Fortunately, there are lots of songs that include me gusta or me gustan.

Kids especially need exposure to gustar accompanied by the phrase emphasizing the pronoun - a mí me gusta. At some point they start to hear the subject and relate the subject and verb. When they do, they naturally stop saying yo. Here are 9 songs that you can sing with kids to reinforce gustar.

A mí me gusta la fruta by Lonnie Dai Zovi
This song is more of a chant. It is excellent for teaching a mí también. Even kids who usually use me gusta correctly will say yo también to agree with someone saying me gusta. This song teaches the correct, very common, response.

Traigan sus pies by Calico Spanish. I like this song because it uses A todos los niños les gusta (bailar, cantar, aplaudir, etc.). Songs tend to use a mí me gusta and it is helpful to reinforce the other pronouns.

Jugo de naranja by Patti Lozano uses me gusta in the negative and has lots of food vocabulary.

A mí, me gusta viajar by Rockalingua teaches modes of transportation and repeats gustar several times. In addition to the song with a lyric sheet, there is a free video on the Rockalingua website.

A mí me gusta leer is another Rockalingua song that reinfoces the verb gustar and teaches vocabulary for fun characters.

Me gusta leer by Spanish Together is also about reading. It has much simpler lyrics and works well with younger students. You can listen to a clip of Me gusta leer on iTunes.

Preschoolers and kindergartens like the traditional song A mi mono le gusta la lechuga. The words are silly, about a monkey that likes his lettuce ironed flat, without any wrinkles. Like many traditional songs, there are several tunes. This is the version I know, but you can find other videos on YouTube with slightly different melodies.

Victor Hugo Santos has a couple of songs that reinforce gustar. You can hear clips on iTunes. One, Me gustan los colores uses gustar with lots of basic vocabulary. Another, Me gustan mis amigos , teaches physical descriptions.

For younger kids, you can also make up your own songs using gustar to familiar tunes. Older kids can sing along with popular songs, such as Lo que me gusta hacer by El Palacio de Linares. You can listen to the song and read the lyrics here.

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Me Gusta Cantar: 9 Songs to Practice Gustar - Spanish Playground

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One of the first things kids learn in Spanish class is me gusta. Logically, they equate the structure with I like, but that logic trips them up for years! It takes lots of exposure and practice to internalize the correct structure of the verb.

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This is a classic song by Manu Chau for learning to use "gustar" through example.  This is not the official video but is handy since it has the lyrics.  Manu Chau often mixes languages in his songs so you might notice a little French thrown in ("je ne sais pas"; "je ne sais plus").

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These video lessons are short and the instructor, Jordan,  is articulate and includes a lot of examples:

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Learn Spanish - Talking about Likes/Dislikes (part 1)

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SUBSCRIBE for more Spanish videos: http://bit.ly/XGe7we Follow me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/srjordanspanish Tweet me: https://twitter.com/senorjordan Check out my website: http://www.senorjordan.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In this video, we'll be talking about the phrase 'Me gusta', which could be roughly translated as 'I like' and how to use it with verbs to tell what you like to do.

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Have a look around the web to see what resources are out there for learning to use "gustar" and other similar Spanish verbs. Share your favorites here on this Padlet page. Tell us what you like about this particular resource and how it helps you learn to use gustar. The title of your post should be your name so we know who is posting.  (To add a post, double click anywhere on the screen)