Grammar 6.3: The verbs "saber" and "poder" plus infinitive

 

I do not understand this book of yours. There is literally no reason for this topic to be an entire grammar section on its own.

 

It's dead simple, basically:

• If you want to express that anyone knows how to do something, you use the verb "saber" immediately followed by a verb in infinitive.
• If you want to express that anyone is able to (ie, can) do something, you use the verb "poder" immediately followed by a verb in infinitive.
• That's it.

Again:

If you want to express that anyone knows how to do something, you use the verb "saber" immediately followed by a verb in infinitive.

• We never translate the "how" part of "knowing how". Your book even manages to point this out on page 191.
• The only thing remotely special about "saber" is that it has an irregular yo-form in the present tense, which you must memorize:
• It is "sé" (with accent mark; it's mandatory)

All other present-tense forms are completely normal:

 

And again:

If you want to express that anyone is able to (ie, can) do something, you use the verb "poder" immediately followed by a verb in infinitive.

 

The only thing special about "poder" is that it stem-changes o to ue in the present tense.

Let's see some examples to close:

Conjugated "saber" plus verb in infinitive for knowing how to do something:

• Mi ex-novio sabe bucear muy bien.
• Sé hablar italiano.
• ¿Sabes cocinar?

Conjugated "poder" plus verb in infinitive for being able to do something:

• Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche. (This is actually the first line of a very famous poem, Poema 20, by the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda.)
• Ustedes pueden consultar el libro de texto durante el examen.
• Celia y yo no podemos asistir a la fiesta de nuestro amigo Ricardo.