Breakdown of Молодой школьник читает книгу в парке.
Questions & Answers about Молодой школьник читает книгу в парке.
Школьник means a school pupil – a child or teenager who goes to school (elementary, middle, or high school).
- школьник = schoolchild / schoolboy (male)
- школьница = schoolgirl (female)
- студент = a student at university or college, not at school
So молодой школьник suggests a young boy of school age, not a university student.
In Russian, adjectives agree with the noun in:
- gender
- number
- case
Here:
- школьник is masculine, singular, nominative (subject).
- So молодой is also masculine, singular, nominative.
The full nominative singular forms of молодой are:
- masculine: молодой школьник
- feminine: молодая школьница
- neuter: молодое дерево
- plural (all genders): молодые школьники
Because школьник is the subject in the nominative, молодой must also be nominative masculine singular.
Книгу is the accusative singular form of книга.
- Nominative (dictionary form): книга – a/the book (subject)
- Accusative (direct object): книгу – a/the book (object)
The verb читать (to read) takes a direct object in the accusative case. So:
- Школьник читает книгу. – The schoolboy is reading a book.
Feminine nouns ending in -а usually change -а → -у in the accusative singular:
- машина → машину
- книга → книгу
The preposition в can take two different cases:
Prepositional (где? – where?) – for location:
- в парке – in the park (location)
- в доме – in the house
Accusative (куда? – to where?) – for direction/movement:
- в парк – into the park / to the park (direction)
- в дом – into the house
In Молодой школьник читает книгу в парке, we are talking about where he is reading (location), so в takes the prepositional case:
- Nominative: парк
- Prepositional: в парке – in the park
Читает is:
- present tense
- 3rd person singular
- imperfective aspect (from читать)
It can mean:
- is reading (right now)
- reads / usually reads (habitually)
Compare:
- Он читает книгу. – He is reading / He reads a book.
- Он прочитает книгу. – He will read (finish reading) the book.
- прочитать is perfective, so its “present” form actually refers to the future.
- Он прочитал книгу. – He (has) read / finished reading the book. (past perfective)
In real present-time actions, you normally use the imperfective (читает), not a perfective form.
Читать is a first-conjugation verb. In the present tense:
- я читаю – I read / am reading
- ты читаешь – you read (singular, informal)
- он/она читает – he/she reads
- мы читаем – we read
- вы читаете – you read (plural/formal)
- они читают – they read
The 3rd person singular ending for this type of verb is -ет:
- чита- + -ет → читает
So молодой школьник читает = the young schoolboy reads / is reading.
Stressed syllables in capitals:
- молодОй – ma-la-DOY
- шкОльник – SHKOL’-nik (with soft ль = ly)
- читАет – chi-TA-yet
- кнИгу – KNEE-goo
- в пАрке – v PAR-ke
Rough phonetic transcription (not strict IPA):
- молодой школьник читает книгу в парке
→ ma-la-DOY SHKOL’-nik chi-TA-yet KNEE-goo v PAR-ke
Note how the soft sign ь in школьник makes л soft, like the ly in million.
Yes, Russian word order is relatively flexible, and both are grammatically correct:
Молодой школьник читает книгу в парке.
- Neutral, straightforward: A young schoolboy is reading a book in the park.
В парке молодой школьник читает книгу.
- Emphasis on в парке (in the park), as if contrasting with some other place.
Молодой школьник в парке читает книгу.
- Slightly emphasizes в парке as a descriptive detail, or contrasts “in the park” with “at home”, etc.
In spoken Russian, intonation and context decide what is emphasized, but all these orders are acceptable and natural.
Russian has no articles (no equivalents of a/an or the). The same sentence:
- Молодой школьник читает книгу в парке.
can be translated as:
- A young schoolboy is reading a book in the park., or
- The young schoolboy is reading the book in the park.
The choice of a vs the in English depends on context, not on a specific Russian word. If you really want to stress that it’s “one particular boy”, you might say:
- Один молодой школьник читает книгу в парке. – One young schoolboy is reading a book in the park.
The soft sign ь does not represent a sound by itself. It makes the preceding consonant soft (palatalized).
In школьник:
- without soft sign: школ would have a hard л [l]
- with soft sign: школь has a soft ль [lʲ], like ly in million
So:
- школа – school
- школьник – schoolboy / schoolchild
The soft sign here is required by spelling rules and changes the pronunciation, but there is no common word школник; that would simply be considered a spelling mistake.
You change the noun and the adjective, but the verb form stays the same:
- Молодая школьница читает книгу в парке.
- молодая – feminine nominative singular
- школьница – feminine noun (schoolgirl)
- читает – same 3rd person singular form for he/she/it
All the other words (книгу, в парке) remain unchanged.
You make the subject and verb plural; the rest depends on whether you mean one book or several:
- One book (shared or generic):
- Молодые школьники читают книгу в парке.
- молодые – plural
- школьники – plural of школьник
- читают – 3rd person plural of читать
- Several books:
- Молодые школьники читают книги в парке.
- книги – accusative plural (same as nominative for inanimate nouns)
Both are correct, meaning either “a (single) book” or “books”.
Omitting молодой is fine:
- Школьник читает книгу в парке. – The schoolboy is reading a book in the park.
Omitting школьник is different:
- Читает книгу в парке. literally: Is reading a book in the park.
This second version has no explicit subject. Russian often drops pronouns (like он, она) when they’re obvious, but normally you don’t drop a full noun like школьник unless:
- it’s a headline, note, or telegraphic style, or
- the subject is extremely clear from context.
In standard full-sentence speech or writing, you keep the noun:
Молодой школьник читает книгу в парке.