Learn Dutch: Hoewel de studenten niet spieken, is hun werkstuk soms best slecht. - Although the students do not cheat, their assignment is sometimes quite bad.

The sentence starts with a subordinate clause introduced by hoewel (although). Because this entire clause occupies the first position in the overall sentence, the main clause must begin with its verb (is) to satisfy the Dutch verb-second (V2) rule. This is immediately followed by the subject, hun werkstuk.

Since studenten is plural, why is werkstuk singular? Shouldn't it be plural as well?

In Dutch, if a group of people each possess one item of the same kind, it is very common to use the singular form for that item. Using hun werkstuk implies that each student has one assignment. Saying hun werkstukken could accidentally suggest that each individual student submitted multiple assignments.

Why does best mean "quite" here instead of "best"?

In Dutch, best is a common false friend for English speakers. When used as an adverb before an adjective (like slecht), it means "quite", "fairly", or "pretty". If you wanted to say "best" in the sense of "the best assignment", you would typically use het beste.

Does spieken mean "to cheat" in any context?