Imperfect Subjunctive & Se Clauses

The imperfect subjunctive is the "if I had…" tense. You build it from the third-person plural of the preterite (eles falaram, comeram, partiram) — drop -ram and add the personal endings.

• falaram → fala- → falasse, falasse, falássemos, falassem
• comeram → come- → comesse, comesse, comêssemos, comessem
• partiram → parti- → partisse, partisse, partíssemos, partissem

Build from the preterite and every irregular comes along for free: fizeram → fizesse, foram → fosse, tiveram → tivesse, estiveram → estivesse, souberam → soubesse.

Master table — imperfect subjunctive

The irregulars come from the preterite

The se sentence — the whole point

Se + imperfect subjunctive, ___ + conditional.

Se eu tivesse tempo, eu viajaria mais. "If I had time, I'd travel more."

The two halves are locked together. You almost never see one without the other.

Build the se sentence

Cloze — fill both sides of the se

Translate the hypotheticals