Lesson: Verbs

Probably the worst part about learning a new language is learning verbs. We are going to learn two today, and then later, I am going to go over how to make learning them about ten times easier. For now pay attention to the endings as they change depending on which pronoun you are using.

Here are the the pronouns we will be using in this lesson:

• Я (ya) - I
• ты (tea) - you (familiar)
• он (own) - he
• она (ona) - she
• мы (me) - us
• вы (vee)- you (formal or plural)
• они (onie) - they

понимать (po-nu-mat) - to understand

• я понимаю - I understand
• ты понимаешь - you understand
• он понимаешь - he understands
• она понимаешь - she understands
• мы понимаем - we understand
• вы понимаете - you understand
• они понимают - they understand

говорить (gov-or-root) - to speak (in)

• Я говорю - I speak
• ты говоришь - you speak
• он говорит - he speaks
• она говорит - she speaks
• мы говорим - we speak
• вы говорите - you speak
• они говорят - they speak

Now suppose you want to actually use these verbs in a sentence. Well you already know how to say a few nationalities. To say that someone speaks "in" Russian for example, you would say "Она говорит по-русски" by adding "по-" to a nationality with the ending "ки".

This works equally for the verb "to understand". If you wanted to say that you understand "in" Russian, you would say "Я понимаю по-русски."

If you want to ask someone if they speak "in" English, the same formula applies, only you would add intonation. "Ты говоришь по-английски?"