Spanish language Q&A Forum

You should probably add this to the brainmap - I could only locate this by manually searching through the library

I just completed a translation exercise which included the following sentence:

"... we see the fireworks and we receive gifts from Father Christmas."

I translated the sentence as follows: "... vemos los fuegos artificiales y recibimos regalos desde Papá Noel". Kwiziq indicated that the correct translation should have been "... vemos los fuegos artificiales y recibimos los regalos de Papá noel."

I have two question about this: 

1) Why was it necessary to insert "los" in front of "regalos"? I do not understand fully the rule of when the definite articles (singular or plural) must be used. As you can see, I inserted it when  "the" was included before "fireworks" in the English translation, but omitted "los" when "the" was not included before "gifts" in the English translation. Again, what's the rule on this? When I practice the writing exercises seems use of articles is hit and miss.

2) I am confused about why "de" was used as translation of "from" instead of "desde". Seems "regalos de Papá Noel" would translate in English to Santa Claus's gifts. Please explain.

Thank you!

Pati Ecuamiga.

Hello,

I was wondering why the singular "el" is used in the sentence : 

"y hace escala en el Amazonas, Barbados y Chile. "  I would have thought it would be plural, as they are going to several destinations and if that doesn't factor in, then the Amazonas are plural or is that considered one country. Also, would it be correct to say: "y hace escala en Amazonas, Barbados y Chile. "  and leave out the "el" ?

Thank you. 

Hello all, sorry if this is a long and unusal question..
Are there any professional teachers here, or professionals who have studied learning methods?
I am determined to get the very best from the software, but wonder if I am. 
For example, i complete each of the "writing practice" exercises twice, back to back, which in my mind means that I am cementing my learning, but on the second run through I'm concerned that I may just have blindly memorised each answer.  I do stop and research every part I get wrong if I don't see my mistake, but I'm still concerned I'm just being a parrot.
So, over to the professionals, what would you recommed for best learning practice in this software?
Thanks

This isn't a question, rather a big "thank you" for the explanation of how to work out if a word is of Greek origin. Idioma and Sistema always have me struggling to remember whether they're masculine or feminine. This tip will change everything! Thanks!

In the sentence "Al calentar la leche me quemé"  I feel like in English we would use a comma between 'leche' and 'me' to separate the two clauses. Is this not the case in Spanish? (I might have it wrong in English.)