Дети сидели на лужайке и ели яблоки.

to sit

Breakdown of Дети сидели на лужайке и ели яблоки.

• есть: to eat
• яблоко: the apple
• и: and

Questions & Answers about Дети сидели на лужайке и ели яблоки.

What does Дети mean, and why isn’t it something like ребёнки?

Дети means children. It is the irregular plural of ребёнок (child).

Russian has a number of nouns with irregular plural forms, and this is one of the most common:

• ребёнок = child
• дети = children

So a learner just has to memorize this pair.

Why do сидели and ели both end in -ли?

Because both verbs are in the past tense plural.

In Russian, past tense verbs agree with the subject in gender/number:

• masculine singular: сидел
• feminine singular: сидела
• neuter singular: сидело
• plural: сидели

Since дети is plural, both verbs take the plural past ending:

• сидели = were sitting / sat
• ели = were eating / ate

Unlike English, Russian does not need an extra word like were here.

Why doesn’t Russian use a separate form like were sitting or were eating?