הוא מעתיק את מה שהמורה כותבת מהלוח למחברת, כי אין לו זמן לכתוב לאט.

In Hebrew, the present tense is usually expressed with a single word, not with a separate word like is.

So:

• הוא מעתיק = he copies / he is copying
• המורה כותבת = the teacher writes / is writing

Hebrew present tense can cover both the simple present and the present continuous, and the exact meaning comes from context.

It could sometimes omit הוא, but in the present tense Hebrew verbs do not clearly show person the way English does.

For example, מעתיק only tells you:

• masculine
• singular
• present

It does not by itself tell you whether the subject is he, you, or something like a man/student in context. So adding הוא makes the subject clear: he.

Because הוא and המורה are two different subjects.

• הוא מעתיק = he is copying
• המורה כותבת = the teacher is writing

The verb כותבת is feminine singular, so it tells us that the teacher is female.

This is especially useful because מורה can refer to either a male or a female teacher. The verb shows which one is meant here.

את here is the direct object marker. It does not have a direct English translation.

Hebrew uses את before a definite direct object. In this sentence, the object is the whole phrase:

מה שהמורה כותבת = what the teacher is writing

So:

• הוא מעתיק את מה שהמורה כותבת
  = He is copying what the teacher is writing

Even though English does not use a separate word here, Hebrew does.

This structure means what the teacher is writing or more literally that which the teacher is writing.

Breakdown:

• מה = what
• ש־ / שה־ = that / which
• המורה כותבת = the teacher is writing

So מה ש... is a very common Hebrew pattern meaning what ...:

• מה שהוא אומר = what he says
• מה שאני רוצה = what I want

These are prepositions attached directly to nouns:

• מ־ = from
• ל־ = to / into

So:

• מהלוח = from the board
• למחברת = to the notebook / into the notebook

Together:

מהלוח למחברת = from the board to the notebook

This shows the direction of the copying.

Hebrew often expresses possession with יש and אין plus ל־.

• יש לו זמן = he has time
• אין לו זמן = he doesn't have time

Literally, אין לו זמן is something like there is no time to him, but in natural English it means he doesn't have time.

Also:

• לו = to him
• לה = to her
• לי = to me

This is a very common Hebrew pattern, so it is worth getting used to.

Because after זמן in this kind of sentence, Hebrew commonly uses an infinitive to describe the action there is or isn't time for.

So:

• אין לו זמן לכתוב = he doesn't have time to write

This works very much like English to write.

In the full sentence:

• אין לו זמן לכתוב לאט = he doesn't have time to write slowly

לאט means slowly, and in Hebrew adverbs often come after the verb.

So:

• לכתוב לאט = to write slowly

That word order is very natural in Hebrew. English can also place the adverb after the verb phrase, so this part matches English fairly well.

In this sentence, yes, כי means because.

So the second part explains the reason for the first part:

• הוא מעתיק... כי אין לו זמן...
  = He is copying ... because he doesn't have time ...

Depending on context, כי can sometimes be translated in slightly different ways, but because is the right choice here.

Not necessarily. מעתיק means copies / is copying. By itself, it just describes copying something from one place to another.

In this sentence, the phrase מהלוח למחברת makes it clear that he is copying from the board into his notebook, which is a normal classroom action, not cheating.

So here מעתיק means something like:

• copying down
• copying from the board

In unpointed Hebrew writing, למחברת can be ambiguous.

It may mean:

• to a notebook
• to the notebook

Why? Because when ל־ combines with ה־ in pointed Hebrew, the spelling without vowels can end up looking the same.

In this sentence, the natural meaning is simply that he is copying the material into his notebook, so English often just says into his notebook or into the notebook depending on context.