Nouns and articles - Gender
Spanish nouns have gender, unlike the English:
"the house" in Spanish is feminine, "la casa."The article "the" will also have gender and agree with the noun in gender and number.

Regular feminine nouns end in "a" and the article used would be "la". Likewise, regular masculine nouns end in "o," and the article used would be "el":
"el libro" = the book). [The article "el" is NOT the subject pronoun "él"!]

In the next section, you will notice that plurals of nouns ending in a vowel end in "s." (There are some words that end in vowels other than a or o, and you will have to memorize the gender of these words: el traje, the suit; la gente, the people.)

In addition, many nouns end in a consonant. The gender must be memorized.
la ciudad - the city
la canción - the song
el comedor - the dining room

Most nouns that end in the letters -ción are feminine:
la canción (the song)
la recepción (the reception)

Here are some examples of nouns and a few examples of the not-so-numerous exceptions to the rule:
el vuelo (the flight)
el hijo (the son)
la puerta (the door)
la sala (the living room)
* These exceptions probably originated from Greek words:
el día (the day)
el mapa (the map)

The next page will discuss plurals of nouns.