Lítið hrós frá kennaranum gaf henni meira sjálfstraust í dag.

The subject is Lítið hrós frá kennaranum.

So the sentence is built like this:

• Lítið hrós frá kennaranum = the thing doing the giving
• gaf = gave
• henni = to her
• meira sjálfstraust = more self-confidence
• í dag = today

That may feel a little unusual to an English speaker, because English often prefers something like The teacher's praise gave her more confidence today. In Icelandic, it is perfectly natural to make the praise the subject.

Because lítið agrees with hrós, and hrós is a neuter singular nominative noun here.

In Icelandic, adjectives must match the noun they describe in:

• gender
• number
• case

Here:

• hrós = neuter
• singular
• nominative, because it is the subject

So the adjective must also be neuter singular nominative:

• lítið hrós = little praise / a small compliment

Compare:

• lítill drengur = a little boy
• lítil bók = a small book
• lítið hrós = a little bit of praise / a small compliment

Hrós means praise or a compliment.

In this sentence, lítið hrós most naturally means:

• a little praise
• or a small compliment

It can work a bit like an uncountable noun in English, but in real use it can also refer to a specific compliment. So depending on context, the phrase could feel either slightly abstract or slightly concrete.

Here the meaning is basically that even a small amount of praise had a positive effect on her confidence.

Because it comes after the preposition frá, and frá takes the dative case.

So:

• kennari = teacher
• frá kennara = from a teacher
• frá kennaranum = from the teacher

The ending -num is the definite article attached to the dative singular form.

So kennaranum means the teacher in the dative case.

This is a very common Icelandic pattern:

• frá skólanum = from the school
• frá vini mínum = from my friend
• frá kennaranum = from the teacher

Because gefa uses a dative indirect object.

The pattern is:

• að gefa einhverjum eitthvað
• to give someone something

So:

• einhverjum = someone, in dative
• eitthvað = something, usually in accusative

In the sentence:

• henni = to her, dative
• meira sjálfstraust = more self-confidence, direct object

Compare:

• Ég gaf henni bók. = I gave her a book.
• Hann gaf mér gjöf. = He gave me a gift.

If you used hana, that would be accusative her, not the dative form needed here.

Yes. Gaf is the past tense singular of gefa = to give.

This verb is irregular, so the past tense is not built in a simple predictable way.

Useful forms:

• að gefa = to give
• gefur = gives
• gaf = gave
• gáfu = gave, plural
• gefið = given

So:

• Lítið hrós ... gaf henni ... = A little praise ... gave her ...

Meira means more, and it is the correct form here because sjálfstraust is a neuter singular noun.

A few things are happening:

1. meiri / meira / meira is the comparative of mikill = much / great
2. It must agree with the noun it modifies
3. sjálfstraust is neuter singular, so the form is meira

So:

• meira sjálfstraust = more self-confidence

This is very natural with abstract or uncountable ideas:

• meira vatn = more water
• meira pláss = more space
• meira sjálfstraust = more self-confidence

Because here it is a neuter singular noun, and for many neuter nouns, the nominative and accusative singular look the same.

In this sentence, sjálfstraust is the direct object of gaf, so it is in the accusative. But its accusative form is still sjálfstraust.

So even though the case changes, the word itself does not visibly change.

This is common with neuter nouns in Icelandic.

Yes: it changes the focus.

This sentence focuses on the praise itself as the thing that had the effect:

• Lítið hrós frá kennaranum gaf henni meira sjálfstraust í dag.
• A little praise from the teacher gave her more self-confidence today.

If you made the teacher the subject, the meaning would shift slightly:

• Kennarinn gaf henni hrós í dag.
• The teacher gave her praise today.

That sentence mainly reports the teacher’s action.
The original sentence emphasizes the result of the praise: it increased her confidence.

So the current wording is not random; it highlights cause and effect.

Because Icelandic does not have an indefinite article like English a/an.

So Icelandic often just uses the bare noun:

• bók = a book
• kennari = a teacher
• lítið hrós = a little praise / a small compliment

Definiteness is usually shown either by:

• context
• a separate word like a demonstrative
• or the attached definite article, as in kennaranum = the teacher

So lítið hrós does not need a separate word for a.

Yes, it can move. Icelandic word order is flexible, but verb-second is an important rule in main clauses.

In the given sentence, the order is very natural:

• Lítið hrós frá kennaranum gaf henni meira sjálfstraust í dag.

Putting í dag at the end sounds neutral and straightforward.

You can move it for emphasis, for example:

• Í dag gaf lítið hrós frá kennaranum henni meira sjálfstraust.

That is grammatical, but the emphasis changes, and it may sound less natural in everyday speech depending on context.

So the end position is common because it lets the sentence flow naturally, with the time expression added last.

Not by itself. Lítið hrós simply means little praise or a small amount of praise.

If you wanted to say too little praise, you would need something like:

• of lítið hrós

So in this sentence, lítið is just describing the amount or smallness of the praise, not criticizing it as insufficient.

In fact, the sentence suggests the opposite idea: even a small amount of praise helped her.

A very useful way is to break it into chunks:

• Lítið hrós = little praise
• frá kennaranum = from the teacher
• gaf henni = gave her
• meira sjálfstraust = more self-confidence
• í dag = today

And the grammar pattern is:

• subject
  • verb
    • indirect object (dative)
      • direct object
        • time expression

More abstractly:

• [something] gaf [someone-DAT] [something-ACC]

That same pattern appears in many other Icelandic sentences, so this one is a very useful model to learn from.