📖LearnModule 14 · Lesson 9 of 30Proficient User · CEFR C2, continuedUnit 2 · Las expresiones fijas
Los refranes
Module 14 of the free Spanish course (CEFR C2, continued), lesson 9 of 30: A handful of proverbs turn up in Spanish conversation and in Spanish newspapers alike. On this page: 8 words with their genders and respellings, the rule, a watch-out line and the audio — the study notes behind the workbook's QR.
Respellings follow the course’s say-it key; the stressed syllable is in capitals. Print this lesson’s flashcards (PDF) — the words on the front, the English and respelling on the back.
La regla · The rule
A handful of proverbs turn up in Spanish conversation and in Spanish newspapers alike. Más vale tarde que nunca. A caballo regalado no se le mira el diente. El hábito no hace al monje.
Y también · And also
Most are quoted half-finished, because everyone knows the rest. Hearing only a caballo regalado… and knowing what follows is the point at which idiom stops being a vocabulary list.
Ojo · Watch out
A proverb is quoted exactly or not at all: el hábito no hace al monje cannot become el hábito no hace al cura. Often only the first half is said — a caballo regalado… — and the listener supplies the rest.
Do it now — on paper
Say all 8 words aloud twice from the respelling, then once from the Spanish spelling alone — begin with más vale tarde que nunca.
Copy every word with its accents on paper; then cover the English column and write each meaning back from the Spanish.
Write two sentences of your own that get the watch-out line right, then the two practice pages of workbook lesson 9 in Module 14 are the written half of this page.
This free course is the reading half. The writing half — write-in lessons, daily practice pages with built-in review, self-checks and a full answer key — is the companion workbook series, The Spanish Ladder: one workbook per module, fifteen in all, released band by band with the Basic band (Modules 1–5) first.
Keep these words
Turn this lesson’s words into flashcards, then space your reviews — the two habits the research behind our study guides backs hardest.