כשהייתי ילדה, הייתי מתעוררת מוקדם ומסתכלת בשעון כל כמה דקות.

Because the speaker is female. In Hebrew, words like participles and nouns often show gender.

• ילדה = girl
• מתעוררת = waking up / used to wake up, feminine singular
• מסתכלת = looking / used to look, feminine singular

Notice that הייתי does not change here — first-person singular past is the same for men and women.

If the speaker were male, the sentence would be:

כשהייתי ילד, הייתי מתעורר מוקדם ומסתכל בשעון כל כמה דקות.

כשהייתי is made of two parts:

• כש־ = when
• הייתי = I was

So כשהייתי literally means when I was.

Hebrew often attaches short prepositions and conjunctions directly to the following word, so כש is written together with הייתי.

A more formal version would be כאשר הייתי, but כש־ is very common in everyday Hebrew.

Because the sentence means when I was a girl, not when I was the girl.

After a form of to be, Hebrew often uses a noun without the definite article when the meaning is general or descriptive.

• הייתי ילדה = I was a girl
• הייתי הילדה = I was the girl

The second version would only make sense in a very specific context, where the girl has already been identified.

Because Hebrew often uses:

היה / הייתי + participle

to express an ongoing, repeated, or habitual action in the past.

So:

• הייתי מתעוררת = I used to wake up / I would wake up
• הייתי מסתכלת = I used to look / I would look

The forms מתעוררת and מסתכלת are the same forms you see in the present tense, but with הייתי they refer to the past.

This is a very important difference.

• התעוררתי = I woke up
  Usually a simple past event, often one specific occurrence
• הייתי מתעוררת = I used to wake up / I would wake up
  A repeated or habitual action in the past

So in this sentence, the speaker is describing a childhood habit, not one single morning.

Compare:

• אתמול התעוררתי מוקדם. = Yesterday I woke up early.
• כשהייתי ילדה, הייתי מתעוררת מוקדם. = When I was a girl, I used to wake up early.

Because one הייתי can govern both participles:

• הייתי מתעוררת
• ומסתכלת

So the meaning is:

I used to wake up early and look at the clock...

Hebrew does not need to repeat הייתי if the same subject and same time framework continue.

You could say:

כשהייתי ילדה, הייתי מתעוררת מוקדם והייתי מסתכלת בשעון כל כמה דקות.

But that sounds more repetitive and is usually unnecessary.

Because מוקדם here is being used adverbially, meaning early, not as an adjective agreeing with a feminine noun.

In Hebrew, words used like adverbs are often in the masculine singular form by default.

So:

• אני קמה מוקדם = I get up early
• היא הגיעה מוקדם = She arrived early

Even though the subject is feminine, מוקדם stays the same.

Because the verb להסתכל usually takes the preposition ב־, meaning at.

So:

• להסתכל בשעון = to look at the clock
• להסתכל בילד = to look at the child

If you use את, that usually marks a direct object, but להסתכל does not normally work that way.

Also, בשעון is really:

• ב־ = in / at
• השעון = the clock

Together: בשעון = at the clock / at the watch

It means every few minutes.

Literally, it is something like:

• כל = every
• כמה = some / a few / how many
• דקות = minutes

In this expression, כמה does not ask a real question. It means an indefinite small number, like a few.

So:

• כל שתי דקות = every two minutes
• כל כמה דקות = every few minutes

Yes, you could, but the meaning changes slightly.

• להתעורר = to wake up, become awake
• לקום = to get up, rise, get out of bed

So:

• הייתי מתעוררת מוקדם = I used to wake up early
• הייתי קמה מוקדם = I used to get up early

In many situations they are close, but they are not identical. In this sentence, מתעוררת fits well because the next action is looking at the clock, which sounds like something you do right after waking up.

Yes, absolutely.

Both are natural, but they emphasize slightly different things:

• כשהייתי ילדה = when I was a girl / when I was a child
• כשהייתי קטנה = when I was little / when I was young

You can also combine them:

כשהייתי ילדה קטנה... = when I was a little girl...

So the original sentence is fine, but כשהייתי קטנה would also sound very natural in everyday Hebrew.

It can match both, depending on context.

The Hebrew structure הייתי + participle often expresses a repeated past habit, so in English the best matches are:

• I used to wake up early
• I would wake up early

In this sentence, because the speaker is describing a childhood pattern, used to is probably the clearest translation for most learners.

So the full sense is:

When I was a girl, I used to wake up early and look at the clock every few minutes.