La madre viste al niño.

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Breakdown of La madre viste al niño.

• la madre: the mother
• el niño: the boy
• vestir: to dress someone

Questions & Answers about La madre viste al niño.

Why is it al niño instead of el niño?

Because Spanish often uses the personal a before a specific human direct object.

Here, el niño is the person receiving the action of vestir. So Spanish adds a:

• La madre viste a el niño → this contracts to La madre viste al niño

So al here is just a + el.

Important: in this sentence, a does not mean to. It is just marking the boy/the child as a person who is the direct object.

What verb form is viste here?

Here, viste is the third-person singular present tense of vestir.

That means it matches:

• la madre
• ella
• usted

So:

• La madre viste al niño = The mother dresses the child / is dressing the child

Why does vestir become viste and not veste?