Breakdown of Heeft het kind de appel al gegeten?
het kind
the child
hebben
to have
eten
to eat
de appel
the apple
al
already
Questions & Answers about Heeft het kind de appel al gegeten?
Why is the past participle gegeten instead of just "geeten"?
Gegeten is the irregular past participle of the verb eten (to eat). When making a past participle for this verb, Dutch adds an extra g in the middle (ge-g-eten) to make it easier to pronounce. Because it is an irregular verb, you just have to memorize this form!
Why is gegeten pushed all the way to the end of the sentence?
In Dutch, when a sentence has a helping verb (heeft) and a past participle (gegeten), the helping verb stays near the front to ask the question, but the past participle is kicked to the very end of the sentence.
Why is the word al used here and why is it placed there?
Al means "already". Notice its position: short time words like al generally come after a specific object like de appel, but right before the past participle at the end of the sentence.
Why does the sentence use het for kind but de for appel?
Dutch has two words for "the": de and het. Appel is a de-word, and kind is a het-word. You simply have to memorize the correct article when you learn a new noun, though it helps to know that all plural words always use de.
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