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In Spanish, nouns have gender. They are either masculine or feminine. Adjectives must match the gender of the noun they describe.
Most masculine adjectives end in -o, like gato negro (black cat). To make them feminine, we change the -o to -a, like gata negra (black cat). Let's see how the ending changes to match the gender!
Adjectives must also match in number! If a noun is plural (more than one), we add -s or -es to the adjective, like gatos negros (black cats).
✏️ Worked example
Translate the phrase 'the tall girls' into Spanish. The word for 'the' (plural feminine) is 'las', 'girl' is 'chica' (CHEE-kah), and 'tall' is 'alto' (AHL-toh).
Find the gender of the noun. 'Chica' (girl) ends in -a, so it is a feminine noun.
Check the number of the noun. 'Girls' is plural, so we make 'chica' plural by adding -s. It becomes 'chicas'.
Match the adjective 'alto' (tall) to the feminine gender. Change the -o at the end of 'alto' to -a, giving us 'alta'.
Match the adjective 'alta' to the plural number. Add -s to the end, giving us 'altas'.
Put it all together in the correct Spanish order: noun first, then adjective. This gives us: 'las chicas altas' (the tall girls).
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