Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja selittää asiat kärsivällisesti.

A good teacher is patient and explains things patiently.

Breakdown of Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja selittää asiat kärsivällisesti.

• olla: to be
• ja: and
• hyvä: good
• asia: the thing
• selittää: to explain
• opettaja: the teacher
• kärsivällinen: patient
• kärsivällisesti: patiently

Questions & Answers about Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja selittää asiat kärsivällisesti.

Why is there no word for “a” in Hyvä opettaja?

Finnish has no articles at all—no “a/an” and no “the”.

The bare noun opettaja can mean:

• a teacher (indefinite)
• the teacher (definite)
• or teacher in a generic sense

Context tells you which is meant. In this sentence, Hyvä opettaja is best understood as “a good teacher” or “a good teacher (in general)”.

Why is the singular opettaja used when we mean teachers in general?

Finnish often uses a generic singular: a singular noun that refers to any representative of a group.

So Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen… literally “A good teacher is patient…” really means:

• “A good teacher (any good teacher) is patient…”
• effectively the same as English “Good teachers are patient…”

You could also say Hyvät opettajat ovat kärsivällisiä… (“Good teachers are patient…”), but the singular generic is very natural for general statements.

What is the difference between Hyvä opettaja and Opettaja on hyvä?

• Hyvä opettaja = “a good teacher” (adjective directly modifying the noun; an attribute)

  • Hyvä is in front of opettaja, forming one noun phrase.

• Opettaja on hyvä = “The teacher is good” (describing the teacher’s quality as a sentence)

  • opettaja is the subject, on hyvä is the predicate.

In your sentence, Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen…, the focus is on what makes a good teacher: a teacher who is good (as a kind) is patient and explains things patiently.

Why do we use on here and what form is it?

On is the 3rd person singular present tense of olla (“to be”), so it means “is”.

• Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen = “A good teacher is patient.”

The subject (hyvä opettaja) is 3rd person singular, so the verb also takes the 3rd person singular form on. Unlike English, Finnish does not change this form for different persons beyond singular/plural (olen, olet, on, olemme, olette, ovat).

Why is on not repeated before selittää? Why not on kärsivällinen ja on selittää?

Because selittää (“explains”) is a separate, fully conjugated verb, not part of olla on.

The structure is:

• Hyvä opettaja
  
  • on kärsivällinen = “is patient”
  • ja selittää asiat kärsivällisesti = “and explains things patiently”

The subject (Hyvä opettaja) is understood for both verbs:

• (Hyvä opettaja) on kärsivällinen
• (Hyvä opettaja) selittää asiat kärsivällisesti

You don’t say on selittää; that would be ungrammatical.

What is the difference between kärsivällinen and kärsivällisesti?

• kärsivällinen = adjective: “patient”
  
  • Describes a noun:
    
    • kärsivällinen opettaja = “a patient teacher”
• kärsivällisesti = adverb: “patiently”
  
  • Describes a verb / action:
    
    • selittää kärsivällisesti = “explains patiently”

So in the sentence:

• on kärsivällinen → describes what the teacher is (adjective)
• selittää … kärsivällisesti → describes how the teacher explains (adverb)

How is the adverb kärsivällisesti formed from kärsivällinen?

Many Finnish adverbs are formed by adding -sti to an adjective stem.

Roughly:

• kärsivällinen → stem kärsivällise- → kärsivällisesti

You see the same pattern with other -inen adjectives:

• ystävällinen (“friendly”) → ystävällisesti (“in a friendly way”)
• todellinen (“real”) → todellisesti (“really, truly” in some uses)

So -sti is comparable to English “-ly” in many cases.

Why is the object asiat (nominative plural) and not asioita (partitive plural)?

Asiat is the total object form (nominative plural here). It presents “the things” as a whole that get completely explained.

• selittää asiat ≈ “to explain the things / the matters (fully)”

The partitive plural asioita would have a more indefinite or partial feel:

• selittää asioita ≈ “explains some things / explains (various) things”

In a sentence describing what a good teacher does—fully clarifying the material—asiat (total object) fits well: the teacher explains the whole matters, not just bits and pieces.

Can we also say selittää asioita kärsivällisesti? What would change?

Yes, selittää asioita kärsivällisesti is grammatically fine, but the nuance shifts:

• selittää asiat kärsivällisesti
  → explains the things / the matters completely and patiently
• selittää asioita kärsivällisesti
  → explains (some) things / various things patiently; it’s less about fully covering a fixed set of things, more about doing explanations as an activity.

For a motto-like statement about what makes a good teacher, asiat sounds slightly more “complete” and is more typical.

Why is kärsivällisesti at the end of the sentence? Can we move it?

Adverbs are fairly flexible in Finnish. All of these are possible:

• Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja selittää asiat kärsivällisesti.
• Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja selittää kärsivällisesti asiat.
• Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja kärsivällisesti selittää asiat. (a bit more marked/emphatic)

Putting kärsivällisesti at the end is very natural and neutral: it neatly sums up how the explaining is done. When you move it, you slightly change the rhythm or emphasis, but the meaning stays essentially the same.

Why is there no pronoun like hän (“he/she”) in the sentence?

Finnish very often drops subject pronouns when the subject is clear from context or from the verb form.

Here, the subject is explicitly given as Hyvä opettaja, so there is no need for hän:

• You do not need: Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja hän selittää asiat kärsivällisesti.

That longer version is grammatically correct but unnecessary and sounds heavier. The simple Hyvä opettaja on kärsivällinen ja selittää asiat kärsivällisesti is the normal, natural form.