Learn Finnish: Onko opiskelijalla kynä ja tietokone? - Does the student have a pen and a computer?

In Finnish, yes/no questions are made by adding the question particle -ko or -kö to the verb and moving it to the very front of the sentence. While a normal statement starts with the owner (opiskelijalla on for 'the student has'), a question must start with the verb onko.

Why is 'student' written as opiskelijalla instead of the basic form opiskelija?

Finnish doesn't have a direct verb for 'to have'. Instead, it expresses possession using a structure that literally means 'on someone is something'. The adessive ending -lla is added to opiskelija to mean 'on the student'.

Since the student has two things (a pen and a computer), why isn't the verb plural?

In the Finnish possession structure, the verb is always the singular on (or onko for questions), no matter how many things are owned. Even though there is a kynä ja tietokone, you still use the singular verb.

What exactly does the word tietokone mean if you break it down?

It is a compound word! Tieto means 'knowledge' or 'data', and kone means 'machine'. So a computer in Finnish is literally a 'knowledge machine'.