Di kelas memasak, kami menumis kubis dan jamur sambil mendengar instruksi dari guru.

Di means in / at, so di kelas memasak means in cooking class or at cooking class.

Starting the sentence this way sets the scene first. Indonesian often puts a time or place phrase at the beginning, followed by a comma:

• Di kelas memasak, ... = In cooking class, ...
• Di rumah, saya belajar. = At home, I study.

You could also say the sentence without moving that phrase to the front, but the fronted version sounds very natural.

Both kami and kita can mean we, but they are different:

• kami = we, not including the listener
• kita = we, including the listener

So kami here means the speaker is talking about their group, but not including the person being spoken to.

This distinction is very important in Indonesian and often surprises English speakers, since English just uses we for both.

Menumis means to sauté or to stir-fry lightly, usually with a little oil.

It comes from the root tumis. With the meN- prefix, it becomes menumis, which is an active verb:

• tumis = sauté / stir-fry
• menumis = to sauté / to be sautéing

In cooking contexts, menumis is very common.

This is because of how the meN- prefix changes depending on the first sound of the root word.

With roots beginning with t, the t often disappears and the prefix changes shape:

• tulis → menulis
• tonton → menonton
• tumis → menumis

So meN- + tumis becomes menumis.

This is a standard sound change in Indonesian verb formation.

Dengar is the root, meaning hear or listen in a dictionary-like form.
Mendengar is the active verb form used in a normal sentence.

So:

• dengar = root / base form
• mendengar = to hear / to listen

In everyday Indonesian, speakers do sometimes use the root form in casual speech, but in standard written Indonesian, mendengar is the expected form here.

Sambil means while, while also, or at the same time as.

It connects two actions happening simultaneously:

• kami menumis kubis dan jamur = we sautéed / were sautéing cabbage and mushrooms
• sambil mendengar instruksi dari guru = while listening to instructions from the teacher

So sambil shows that both actions happen together.

A very similar example:

• Saya makan sambil menonton TV. = I eat while watching TV.

Because after sambil, Indonesian often does not repeat the subject if it is the same as the subject of the main clause.

So this:

• kami menumis ... sambil mendengar ...

naturally means:

• we sautéed ... while we listened ...

Repeating kami would usually be unnecessary here.

In many contexts, mendengar can cover both hear and listen, depending on context.

Here, because the people are actively paying attention to the teacher’s instructions, English would usually translate it as listening to.

Indonesian does have mendengarkan, which often sounds more explicitly like listen to, especially when focusing on the object being listened to. But mendengar instruksi is perfectly normal and natural here.

Both are possible, but they feel a little different.

• instruksi dari guru = instructions from the teacher
• instruksi guru = the teacher’s instructions

Using dari makes the source especially clear: the instructions come from the teacher.

So dari guru is very straightforward and natural for learners to understand.

Indonesian does not use articles in the same way English does. There is no direct equivalent of a/an or the in most everyday sentences.

So:

• kubis = cabbage / the cabbage / some cabbage
• jamur = mushrooms / the mushrooms / some mushrooms
• guru = teacher / the teacher

The exact meaning depends on context.

If needed, Indonesian can be more specific in other ways, but often it simply leaves that information unstated.

Indonesian often does not mark plural nouns if the meaning is already clear from context.

So jamur can mean:

• mushroom
• mushrooms

Likewise, kubis can refer to cabbage in a general or ingredient sense.

Indonesian can show plural by reduplication:

• jamur-jamur = mushrooms
• buku-buku = books

But in real sentences, repetition is often unnecessary if the listener already understands that more than one item is involved.

No. Kubis is common and standard, but you may also hear kol, which is a widely used borrowed form.

So both can refer to cabbage, depending on region, register, and habit:

• kubis
• kol

In learning materials, kubis often appears as the more formal or standard vocabulary item.

Indonesian does not always need a special marker for continuous action. Context often does the job.

In this sentence, the combination of actions and sambil already makes it clear that the events are happening at the same time in a scene:

• kami menumis ... sambil mendengar ...

So adding sedang is possible, but not necessary:

• Di kelas memasak, kami sedang menumis kubis dan jamur sambil mendengar instruksi dari guru.

That would put extra emphasis on the ongoing nature of the action, but the original sentence is already perfectly natural.

A simple way to break it down is:

• Di kelas memasak = place phrase
• kami = subject
• menumis = main verb
• kubis dan jamur = object
• sambil mendengar instruksi dari guru = simultaneous-action phrase

So the overall pattern is roughly:

Place + Subject + Verb + Object + while + Verb phrase

That makes the sentence quite easy to follow once you identify each chunk.