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Questions & Answers about Unsere Lehrerin ist neu.
Why is it Unsere instead of just Unser?
Unsere means "our". In German, words like "our", "my", or "your" change their ending to match the gender of the noun they describe. Because Lehrerin (female teacher) is a feminine noun, we add an -e to the base word unser, making it unsere.
How do we know that Lehrerin refers to a female teacher specifically?
In German, professions usually have different forms for men and women. The word for a male teacher is Lehrer. To make it refer to a woman, you add the ending -in, creating Lehrerin. You will see this -in ending a lot for jobs and nationalities.
Since Lehrerin is feminine, why doesn't the adjective neu have an -e at the end?
Adjectives in German only get extra endings when they are placed directly before the noun (like in "our new teacher"). When the adjective comes after the verb ist (meaning "is"), it stays in its basic dictionary form. Therefore, neu does not change here.
Why is Lehrerin capitalized?
In German, every single noun (a word for a person, place, thing, or idea) must start with a capital letter, no matter where it appears in the sentence.