Breakdown of Stariji studenti nam često savjetuju da ponavljamo naglas kako bismo bolje pamtili.
Questions & Answers about Stariji studenti nam često savjetuju da ponavljamo naglas kako bismo bolje pamtili.
It can mean both, and context decides.
In a school or university context, stariji studenti is usually understood as:
- students in higher years / more advanced students / upperclassmen, not necessarily much older in age.
If you really want to stress age rather than school year, you could say something like students who are older than us (studenti koji su stariji od nas).
Nam is the unstressed (clitic) form of nama, the dative plural of mi (we).
- mi = we (nominative)
- nas = us (accusative / genitive)
- nam(a) = to us / for us (dative)
Here nam means to us:
Stariji studenti nam savjetuju… = Older students advise us / give advice to us…
The verb savjetovati (nekome) normally takes a dative person: savjetovati nekome nešto = to advise someone about something.
Nam is a clitic (an unstressed short word) and Croatian likes to place clitics in the second position in the clause (the so‑called second‑position clitic rule).
The first element is Stariji studenti (one prosodic unit), so the clitic nam comes right after it:
- Stariji studenti nam često savjetuju…
You can move često around for emphasis (Stariji studenti nam savjetuju često…, Stariji nam studenti često savjetuju…), but nam will still try to stay in that early “second” position.
Savjetovati can work with:
- dative: savjetovati nekome = to give advice to someone
- accusative: savjetovati nekoga = to advise someone (more direct “to counsel someone”)
In this structure with a da‑clause, the natural pattern is:
- savjetovati nekome da... → savjetuju nam da ponavljamo… = they advise us to repeat…
If you said savjetuju nas da ponavljamo, it would sound unusual or wrong in standard Croatian in this exact sentence; speakers expect nekome (dative) here, not nekoga (accusative).
Croatian very often uses da + present tense instead of an infinitive in subordinate clauses after verbs like htjeti, trebati, savjetovati, željeti, voljeti etc.
So you say:
- savjetuju nam da ponavljamo – they advise us to repeat not:
- savjetuju nam ponavljati (possible in some contexts, but much less natural here)
Functionally, da ponavljamo = to repeat, but grammatically it is a finite clause, not an infinitive.
Croatian uses the present tense for:
- actions happening now, and
- habitual / repeated actions or general truths.
Here ponavljamo means we repeat (whenever we study / as a habit).
So da ponavljamo naglas corresponds to English to repeat out loud (as a general method), even though English doesn’t use a present tense form there.
Naglas is an adverb meaning out loud / aloud.
- ponavljati naglas = to repeat out loud
- It answers how we repeat: aloud, not silently.
You may also see na glas written as two words in informal writing, but standard modern usage prefers the one‑word adverb naglas. Another close synonym is glasno (loudly), though glasno focuses more on volume, while naglas contrasts with in your head / silently.
Literally, kako does mean how, but in this structure it functions more like:
- so that / in order that
So:
- …da ponavljamo naglas kako bismo bolje pamtili.
≈ …to repeat out loud so that we remember better.
In purpose clauses like this, Croatian often uses kako (bi) or just da (bi) + conditional:
kako bismo / da bismo bolje pamtili = in order for us to remember better.
Bismo pamtili is the conditional (first conditional, kondicional I).
It is formed with:
- bismo – the conditional form of biti (we would be), used as a clitic auxiliary
- pamtili – past active participle of pamtiti
Together: bismo pamtili ≈ would remember.
So kako bismo bolje pamtili literally is so that we would remember better, which in English is usually translated as so that we remember better / to remember better.
In Croatian, past participles and some forms agree in gender and number with the subject.
- pamtili – masculine plural (used for all‑male or mixed groups, and also as the default if gender is unknown)
- pamtile – feminine plural (used only when the group is known to be all female)
Because mi is gender‑neutral in form (it could be a mixed group), the language defaults to pamtili (masculine plural).
You can say:
- …da ponavljamo naglas kako da bolje pamtimo,
but it is less standard and less elegant; in many dialects it may sound a bit off or colloquial.
The usual and stylistically best form for expressing purpose is:
- kako bismo bolje pamtili, or
- da bismo bolje pamtili,
both meaning so that we remember better / in order to remember better.
Grammatically you can add them, but in normal Croatian they are omitted because the verb endings already show the person and number.
- Stariji studenti nam često savjetuju… – They (the older students) advise us…
- da ponavljamo – that we repeat…
If you say Oni stariji studenti nam često savjetuju da mi ponavljamo…, it sounds over‑explicit or like you are strongly contrasting they and we for some special reason. In neutral sentences, Croatians usually drop oni and mi.
Yes, savjetuju (from savjetovati) is imperfective here and describes a repeated / habitual action: they often advise us.
A common perfective counterpart is posavjetovati:
- Stariji studenti su nas posavjetovali… = The older students advised us (once / completed).
In your sentence, the imperfective savjetuju fits because we are talking about what they often do, not a single completed act.