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Questions & Answers about Park przyciąga dzieci.
Why is there no article the or a in this Polish sentence?
Polish does not use articles. Words like the or a simply don’t exist. Instead, context tells you whether you mean “a park” or “the park.”
What case and grammatical role does park have here?
Park is in the nominative singular case and functions as the subject. Masculine inanimate nouns like park typically use the bare stem (zero ending) in the nominative singular.
What does the verb przyciągać literally mean, and how is it built?
Przyciągać literally comes from the prefix przy- (“toward/near”) + the stem of ciągnąć (“to pull”). Put together, it means “to pull toward,” which we translate as “to attract” or “to draw in.”
What person, number, tense, and aspect is the form przyciąga?
Przyciąga is third person singular, present tense, imperfective aspect of przyciągać. It means “(it) attracts” or “is attracting” in a general or habitual sense.
What case is dzieci, and how do you know it’s the direct object?
Dzieci is in the accusative plural case, serving as the direct object of przyciąga. We know this because przyciągać governs the accusative, and park (nominative) comes first, so dzieci must be the object.
Why does dzieci look the same in nominative and accusative plural?
The noun dziecko (“child”) forms its plural as dzieci in both nominative and accusative. Some irregular nouns have identical forms for certain cases, so you rely on verb government and word order to decide the function.
Why isn’t there a preposition like do (“to”) in Park przyciąga dzieci?
In English we say “attract children to the park,” but in Polish Park przyciąga dzieci already implies movement toward the park. If you want to make the destination explicit, you can say Park przyciąga dzieci do siebie or Park przyciąga dzieci do parku, but the simple version is most natural.
How would you form the passive voice “Children are attracted by the park”?
Use an auxiliary verb and passive participle:
Dzieci są przyciągane przez park
Here są is “are,” przyciągane is the imperfective passive participle, and przez introduces the agent.
How do you make this sentence into a question (“Does the park attract children?”) and into a negation (“The park does not attract children”)?
Question: add Czy (or just raise intonation):
Czy park przyciąga dzieci?
Negation: insert nie before the verb:
Park nie przyciąga dzieci.
How are przyciąga and dzieci pronounced, and where do you put the stress?
Przyciąga is pronounced [pʂɨˈt͡ɕɔŋɡa], with stress on the penultimate syllable (przy-CIĄ-ga).
Dzieci is [ˈd͡ʑɛ.t͡ɕi], with stress on the first syllable (DZIE-ci).