Breakdown of Minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani on puhua suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia.
Questions & Answers about Minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani on puhua suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia.
Yes, both mark possession:
- minun = the genitive form of minä (“I”), literally “of me”
- suunnitelmani = suunnitelma (“plan”) + -ni (possessive suffix “my”) → “my plan”
So minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani is literally “my daily my-plan”.
In standard written Finnish you have three common options:
suunnitelmani
– Most compact, fully standard: “my plan”.minun suunnitelmani
– Also standard; the pronoun adds emphasis or clarity: “my plan”.minun suunnitelma
– Very common in spoken Finnish, but considered colloquial / non-standard in formal writing.
So your sentence could also be:
- Päivittäinen suunnitelmani on…
- Minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani on…
Both are good; the second one just emphasizes that it’s my plan.
Minun is the genitive form of the pronoun minä (“I”).
- minä (nominative) = I
- minun (genitive) = of me / my
Finnish often uses the genitive before a possessed noun:
- minun kirja = my book (colloquial)
- minun kirjani = my book (standard)
- ystäväni auto = my friend’s car (literally “my-friend’s car”)
So minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani literally has a genitive possessor (minun) before the possessed noun (suunnitelma- + -ni).
Yes.
- Päivittäinen suunnitelmani on puhua suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia.
is completely natural and standard. The -ni already tells us it’s “my”.
Adding minun:
- Minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani…
adds emphasis, a bit like saying “my daily plan” in English, perhaps in contrast to someone else’s plan.
They are related but different forms:
päivittäinen = daily (adjective, describes a noun)
- päivittäinen suunnitelma = a daily plan
- päivittäinen rutiini = daily routine
päivittäin = daily / every day (adverb, describes a verb)
- Puhun suomea päivittäin. = I speak Finnish daily / every day.
In your sentence:
- päivittäinen must be an adjective because it modifies suunnitelma (“plan”).
päivittäinen is built from:
- päivä = day
- suffix -ittä(inen) → päivittäinen = “happening every day / daily”
The base meaning is “occurring every day”. So päivittäinen suunnitelma is “a plan that exists for each day / a daily plan”.
We have:
- on = “is”
- puhua = basic infinitive “to speak”
on puhua literally: “is to speak”.
This structure is normal for expressing what a plan, goal, task etc. is:
- Tavoitteeni on oppia suomea. = My goal is to learn Finnish.
- Suunnitelma on mennä elokuviin. = The plan is to go to the movies.
Alternatives and nuances:
- on puhuminen = “is the speaking (of)”, more like treating it as an activity or noun.
- Päivittäinen tehtäväni on suomen puhuminen. (quite stiff/formal)
- puhun suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia = “I speak Finnish for at least five minutes” (a normal statement, not a definition of your plan).
Your sentence defines what the plan is, so on puhua (is to speak) is the natural form.
Because here puhua functions as an infinitive complement to on:
- suunnitelmani on puhua = my plan is to speak.
In this construction:
- The main verb is olla (on) “to be”.
- The infinitive (puhua) is a complement telling what the plan/goal is.
If you used a conjugated verb:
- Suunnitelmani on, että puhun suomea…
= “My plan is that I speak Finnish…”
That’s also possible, but it adds an extra että clause, and sounds heavier. The infinitive (on puhua) is simpler and more common.
With puhua (“to speak”), languages usually appear in the partitive case:
- puhua suomea = to speak Finnish
- puhua englantia = to speak English
- puhua ruotsia = to speak Swedish
So:
- suomi (nominative) → suomea (partitive)
This is just the standard pattern with puhua + language; using nominative (puhua suomi) sounds incorrect to native speakers.
It’s partly idiomatic, but you can think of it like this:
- The partitive often marks:
- an indefinite amount of something
- an ongoing or incomplete action
Speaking a language is like using an indefinite, non-countable “amount” of that language. Finnish tends to treat it as an unbounded activity, so the language name appears in the partitive:
- Puhun suomea. = I speak Finnish (as an ability or activity).
- En ymmärrä suomea. = I don’t understand Finnish.
So suomea is partitive singular of suomi.
Both can be translated as “at least”, but there’s a nuance:
ainakin = at least, at any rate
- Often slightly more informal, can sound a bit like “at least (hopefully / at any rate)”.
vähintään = at least, minimum
- More neutral / mathematical, often used with exact limits.
In your sentence:
- puhua suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia
= speak Finnish for at least five minutes (and possibly more).
You could also say:
- vähintään viisi minuuttia
That would sound a bit more strictly about a minimum quota, whereas ainakin feels a bit softer, more like “well, at least five minutes”.
After numbers greater than one, Finnish normally uses the partitive singular of the noun:
- 1 minute: yksi minuutti (nominative singular)
- 2 minutes: kaksi minuuttia (partitive singular)
- 5 minutes: viisi minuuttia
So:
- minuutti (nominative singular) → minuuttia (partitive singular)
This pattern is used for most countable nouns:
- yksi kirja, mutta kaksi kirjaa, viisi kirjaa
- yksi omena, mutta kolme omenaa, kymmenen omenaa
Minuuttia is partitive singular.
Finnish uses partitive singular after numerals (2 and above) in basic counting:
- kaksi koiraa = two dogs
- kolme taloa = three houses
- neljä opiskelijaa = four students
So viisi minuuttia follows this same rule. This is one of the most regular and important patterns to memorize for numbers in Finnish.
That specific word order is understandable but sounds a bit awkward to natives. The most natural is:
- Päivittäinen suunnitelmani on puhua suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia.
Alternative natural variants:
- Minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani on puhua suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia.
- Päivittäinen suunnitelmani on, että puhun suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia.
Finnish word order is relatively flexible, but there’s still a “most natural” order. In this sentence, keeping ainakin viisi minuuttia right after puhua suomea flows best.
No, not in standard Finnish.
You need the verb on (“is”) to link suunnitelmani (my plan) and puhua suomea… (to speak Finnish…). Without on, the sentence is incomplete.
Correct:
- Minun päivittäinen suunnitelmani on puhua suomea ainakin viisi minuuttia.
Dropping on is not normal in this kind of “X is Y” sentence.