Noćas moja kći nije dobro spavala, jer je još boli grlo.

Noćas literally refers to this night, so its exact English translation depends on the tense and context.

In this sentence, because the verb is in the past, noćas means last night:

• Noćas moja kći nije dobro spavala = My daughter didn’t sleep well last night

With a future meaning, noćas can mean tonight:

• Noćas ću raditi. = I’ll work tonight.

So here, noćas is understood as last night.

Kći means daughter.

So:

• moja = my
• kći = daughter

Together, moja kći = my daughter.

A learner may notice that kći is a somewhat irregular noun. Its declension is not one of the easiest patterns in Croatian, but in the nominative singular (the basic dictionary form), it is simply kći.

You may also encounter kćer in some forms and related usage, but in this sentence the standard nominative form is kći.

Spavala is the past participle used to form the Croatian perfect tense, and it must agree with the subject.

The subject is moja kći = my daughter, which is feminine singular, so the form is:

• spavala = feminine singular

Compare:

• On nije dobro spavao. = He didn’t sleep well.
• Ona nije dobro spavala. = She didn’t sleep well.

And spavati is just the infinitive, meaning to sleep.

This is the Croatian perfect tense in the negative.

The positive form would be:

• je dobro spavala = she slept well / has slept well

The negative is formed with nije:

• nije dobro spavala = she didn’t sleep well

So the structure is:

• nije = negative form of je
• spavala = past participle

This is a very common way to talk about completed actions in the past.

Here dobro means well.

So:

• dobro spavati = to sleep well
• nije dobro spavala = she didn’t sleep well

Even though dobro often means good in other contexts, here it works like the English adverb well.

Because jer means because and introduces an explanatory clause:

• Noćas moja kći nije dobro spavala, jer je još boli grlo.

Croatian normally separates this kind of clause with a comma. So the comma here is standard punctuation.

Jer means because.

So:

• jer je još boli grlo = because her throat still hurts

It is one of the most common ways to give a reason in Croatian.

You could also hear other expressions for because, such as:

• zato što
• budući da (more formal)

But jer is very common and natural in everyday speech.

This is probably the most confusing part for English speakers.

Here, je does not mean is.

In this sentence, je is the short accusative pronoun meaning her.

So:

• je = her
• boli = hurts
• grlo = throat

Literally, the structure is closer to:

• her hurts throat

But in natural English that becomes:

• her throat still hurts
• or more literally: the throat still hurts her

So the full clause means:

• jer je još boli grlo = because her throat still still hurts

More natural English:

• because her throat still hurts

Because Croatian uses boljeti differently from English.

In English, we often say:

• Her throat hurts
• She has a sore throat

In Croatian, the painful body part is often the subject of the verb boljeti:

• Grlo je boli.
• literally: The throat hurts her
• natural English: Her throat hurts

So in your sentence:

• grlo is the subject
• je means her
• boli is hurts

This pattern is very common with body parts:

• Boli me glava. = My head hurts. / literally The head hurts me.
• Bole ga leđa. = His back hurts. / literally The back hurts him.

Croatian word order is flexible, but short pronouns like je usually follow the second-position clitic rule.

After jer, the clitic je tends to come very early:

• jer je još boli grlo

This is normal Croatian clitic placement.

A learner may expect something more like:

• jer grlo još boli nju

but that sounds unnatural in ordinary speech.

So the word order is not random: je is placed early because it is a clitic.

Here još means still.

So:

• još boli grlo = the throat still hurts
• jer je još boli grlo = because her throat still hurts

It shows that the problem has continued up to now.

Yes, it is understandable and natural, but there are a few other very common ways to say the same thing.

For example:

• Noćas moja kći nije dobro spavala jer je još boli grlo.
• Noćas moja kći nije dobro spavala, jer je još uvijek boli grlo.
• Moja kći noćas nije dobro spavala jer je još boli grlo.

All of these are natural.

Adding uvijek after još gives još uvijek, which also means still and can sound a bit fuller:

• još uvijek boli = still hurts

Yes. That is another very common structure.

• Moju kćer boli grlo. = My daughter’s throat hurts / literally The throat hurts my daughter

Here:

• moju kćer is in the accusative
• grlo is still the subject

That sentence is closely related to:

• Moja kći... jer je još boli grlo

In your original sentence, the person has already been introduced as moja kći, so the next clause uses the pronoun je = her instead of repeating moju kćer.

Yes. A very literal translation can sound strange because Croatian and English structure the hurting part differently.

Very literal:

• Last night my daughter did not sleep well, because her throat still hurts her.

Natural English:

• My daughter didn’t sleep well last night because her throat still hurts.
• My daughter didn’t sleep well last night because she still has a sore throat.

So the meaning is straightforward, but the Croatian grammar does not match English word-for-word.