Learn Hardcore Russian: Ленивый студент редко повторяет слова и часто делает ошибки. - A lazy student rarely reviews words and often makes mistakes.

студент is the nominative singular form of “student.”
ленивый is an adjective meaning “lazy.” It must agree with студент in:
- gender: masculine
- number: singular
- case: nominative

So both words are nominative masculine singular: ленивый студент = “a lazy student.”

студента is the genitive or accusative form and would be used in different roles (after certain prepositions, as a direct object in some situations, etc.), but not as the subject here.

Why is there no word for “a” or “the” before ленивый студент?

Russian has no articles (no equivalents of English a/an or the).

Whether you understand ленивый студент as:

“a lazy student,”
“the lazy student,” or
just “lazy student” in a general sense

depends entirely on context, not on a separate word.

In this sentence, by default, many learners would interpret it as “a lazy student” unless previous context has established a specific student.

How do ленивый and студент agree with each other?

Adjectives in Russian must agree with the nouns they describe in gender, number, and case.

студент – masculine, singular, nominative.
ленивый – masculine, singular, nominative ending -ый.

That’s why you get ленивый студент.

If you changed the noun, the adjective would change too:

ленивая студентка – lazy (female) student (feminine singular)
ленивые студенты – lazy students (plural)
ленивого студента – of the lazy student / lazy student (object) (genitive/accusative masculine)

Why is it повторяет and делает and not some other verb forms?

Both verbs are in the 3rd person singular present tense, agreeing with the subject студент (“he” / “she” in English structure, but Russian doesn’t need a pronoun here).

повторять (to repeat, to revise) – imperfective
- он/она повторяет = “he/she repeats” / “(he) revises”
делать (to do, to make) – imperfective
- он/она делает = “he/she does / makes”

Since the sentence describes what this student typically / habitually does, present tense, 3rd person singular is the natural choice:
(Он) редко повторяет… и часто делает…

Why are imperfective verbs (повторяет, делает) used here and not perfective ones?

Imperfective aspect in Russian is used for:

habitual / repeated actions
general descriptions of behavior
ongoing or typical situations

The sentence describes what a lazy student generally tends to do (or not do), not a single completed event. So we use:

повторяет (imperfective) instead of повторит (perfective “will repeat once / will have repeated”)
делает (imperfective) instead of сделает (perfective “will make / will have made”)

Perfective would sound like you’re focusing on one specific occasion or a completed result, which doesn’t fit the habitual meaning here.

What part of speech are редко and часто, and what do their forms mean?

редко and часто are adverbs (наречия). They modify verbs and describe how often something happens.

редко = rarely, seldom
часто = often, frequently

They don’t change their form for gender, number, or case — adverbs in Russian are invariable. Their job is to describe frequency of the actions повторяет and делает.

Why is редко placed before повторяет, and часто before делает? Could they go somewhere else?

The neutral word order is:

редко повторяет – “rarely repeats”
часто делает – “often makes/does”

In Russian, adverbs like редко, часто typically go before the verb they modify, but word order is flexible. You can say, for example:

Студент редко повторяет слова. (neutral, common)
Студент повторяет слова редко. (still correct; a slight emphasis on “rarely” as a comment)

In the full sentence, you could also say:

Ленивый студент редко повторяет слова и часто делает ошибки. (standard)
Ленивый студент редко повторяет слова и ошибки часто делает. (possible, but sounds stylized/emphatic)

The given order is the most natural and neutral.

What form is слова, and why is it used here?

слова is the accusative plural of слово (“word”). For neuter nouns like слово, the nominative plural and accusative plural are the same: слова.

singular:
- nominative: слово
- accusative: слово
plural:
- nominative: слова
- accusative: слова

In this sentence, слова is the direct object of повторяет (“repeats what?” → “words”), so we need the accusative plural, which looks identical to the nominative plural.

What form is ошибки, and why is it used with делает?

ошибки is the accusative plural of ошибка (“mistake”). For most feminine nouns ending in -а, the nominative plural and accusative plural are the same:

singular:
- nominative: ошибка
- accusative: ошибку
plural:
- nominative: ошибки
- accusative: ошибки

Here, ошибки is the direct object of делает (“makes what?” → “mistakes”), so accusative plural is required. The phrase делать ошибки is a standard collocation meaning “to make mistakes.”

Can I change the order to Часто ленивый студент делает ошибки и редко повторяет слова? Is it still correct?

Yes, that sentence is grammatically correct and understandable. Russian allows quite a lot of flexibility in word order.

However, small differences in emphasis can appear:

Original: Ленивый студент редко повторяет слова и часто делает ошибки.
- More neutral, starts by stating that the student is lazy, then describes his two habits.
Your variant: Часто ленивый студент делает ошибки и редко повторяет слова.
- Slightly more emphasis on часто (“often”) at the beginning — it can sound a bit more marked or rhetorical, like you’re highlighting how often he makes mistakes.

For everyday neutral style, the original word order is more typical.

Where is the stress in these words: ленивый студент редко повторяет слова и часто делает ошибки?

Stress in this sentence:

лени́вый – stress on ни
студе́нт – stress on де́нт
ре́дко – stress on ре́д
повторя́ет – stress on я́ (po-vto-ryá-yet)
слова́ – stress on ва́ (slo-vá)
ча́сто – stress on ча́
де́лает – stress on де́ (dé-lai-et)
оши́бки – stress on ши́б (o-shíb-ki)

Correct stress is very important in Russian; misplacing it can sometimes make words hard to understand or sound unnatural.