Questions & Answers about Iso puu kasvaa metsässä.
Why does the verb kasvaa look exactly the same as its dictionary form?
The dictionary form of "to grow" is kasvaa. To make it "it grows", we take the stem kasva- and apply the rule for the "he/she/it" form: double the last vowel. kasva- + a gives us kasvaa. For Type 1 verbs that already end in -aa or -ää, the dictionary form and the "he/she/it" form look identical!
Both puu and kasvaa end in two vowels. Is puu also a Type 1 verb?
No, puu is a noun meaning "tree". The current lesson teaches that Type 1 verbs end in two vowels, but remember that many Finnish nouns and adjectives also end in two vowels. You just have to learn which words are action words (verbs) and which are things (nouns).
Why is the ending on metsässä spelled with ä instead of a?
This is because of vowel harmony. The root word is metsä (forest). Because it contains the front vowel ä (and e is neutral), the "in" ending must match it by using ä, making it -ssä instead of -ssa.
The English translation says "A big tree", but how do we know it's not "The big tree"?
Finnish does not have articles like "a", "an", or "the". The phrase iso puu can mean either "a big tree" or "the big tree". You usually figure out which one is meant from the rest of the conversation.
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