Breakdown of يمشي الولد بسرعة.
الal
the
ولدwalad
boy
مشىmashâ
to walk / to go, to move along (of a vehicle)
بسرعةbisur'ah
quickly
Questions & Answers about يمشي الولد بسرعة.
Why is the verb يمشي at the beginning of the sentence instead of after the subject?
In Arabic, sentences often start with the verb. This is known as a verbal sentence and is the most standard way to express actions. You could also put the subject first and say الولد يمشي بسرعة, but the verb-first structure used here is very common and natural in Modern Standard Arabic.
I learned that present tense verbs usually end with a short u sound. Why does يمشي end with a long ee sound?
The verb يمشي comes from a root that ends in a weak letter, the letter ي. Verbs with a weak final letter do not take the standard short u ending in the default present tense. Instead, they keep their long vowel sound, so it is pronounced yamshii rather than yamshiyu.
Is بسرعة a single word for quickly, or is it made of two parts?
Arabic does not have a direct equivalent to the English -ly suffix. Instead, it often creates adverbs by attaching the preposition بـ (which means with) to a noun. Here, it is attached to سرعة (speed). So, بسرعة literally means with speed, which translates perfectly to quickly.
When speaking this sentence, how do the words يمشي and الولد connect together?
The word الولد starts with a connecting sound called hamzat wasl, meaning the a sound at the beginning is dropped when it follows another word. When reading fluently, you glide from the ee sound of يمشي directly into the l sound of الولد, sounding like yamshi l-waladu.