Mwalimu alituambia tuhesabu silabi za neno hili kwa sauti.

It can be divided like this:

• a- = he/she
• -li- = past tense marker
• -tu- = us
• -ambi- = verb root related to tell/say to
• -a = final vowel

So alituambia means he/she told us.

Because the subject is Mwalimu (teacher), the whole thing means the teacher told us. Swahili does not mark grammatical gender here, so a- can mean he or she.

Tuhesabu is a subjunctive form, and that is very common after verbs like tell, ask, want, let, and similar ideas.

Breakdown:

• tu- = we
• -hesabu = count

So tuhesabu means something like:

• that we count
• for us to count
• we should count

After alituambia (told us), Swahili uses this kind of form to express what we were told to do. So:

• alituambia tuhesabu = he/she told us to count

Using kuhesabu here would not be the normal choice in this structure.

Mwalimu means teacher.

Swahili does not usually use articles like a, an, or the the way English does. So Mwalimu can mean:

• a teacher
• the teacher
• sometimes just teacher

The context tells you which one is meant. In this sentence, English naturally translates it as the teacher.

In this sentence, silabi means syllables.

Some Swahili nouns, especially loanwords, have the same form in both singular and plural. Silabi is commonly treated that way. What tells you it is plural here is the agreement word za:

• silabi za neno hili = the syllables of this word

The za shows plural agreement here, so the meaning is clearly syllables, not syllable.

This means of this word.

Breakdown:

• za = of for the noun class/plural form used with silabi
• neno = word
• hili = this

So:

• silabi za neno hili = the syllables of this word

A natural way to understand it is:

• silabi = syllables
• za neno hili = belonging to this word / of this word

In Swahili, demonstratives like this often come after the noun.

So:

• neno hili = this word

That word order is normal in Swahili. English usually puts this before the noun, but Swahili often places the equivalent after it.

Literally, kwa sauti means with voice/sound.

In natural English, it usually means:

• aloud
• out loud
• using the voice

So in this sentence, kwa sauti tells you how the counting should be done: not silently, but audibly.

That is a normal place for this kind of adverbial phrase in Swahili.

The sentence structure is roughly:

• Mwalimu = subject
• alituambia = told us
• tuhesabu silabi za neno hili = to count the syllables of this word
• kwa sauti = aloud

Putting kwa sauti at the end is very natural, just like English often puts aloud near the end:

• The teacher told us to count the syllables of this word aloud.

Yes. The base verb is -ambia, which means tell someone, say to someone, or inform someone.

You will often see forms like:

• niambie = tell me
• tuliambiwa = we were told
• alimwambia = he/she told him/her
• alituambia = he/she told us

So this sentence is a good example of how Swahili packs subject, tense, and object into one verb.

Yes. That is very close in meaning.

Because tuhesabu is a subjunctive form, the idea can be expressed in English in several similar ways:

• The teacher told us to count...
• The teacher told us that we should count...
• The teacher instructed us to count...

In this sentence, told us to count is the most natural translation.

A helpful rough guide for an English speaker is:

• Mwa-LEE-mu
• a-lee-tu-am-BEE-a
• tu-heh-SAH-bu
• see-LAH-bee
• za
• NEH-no
• HEE-lee
• kwa
• SAH-oo-tee

A few useful pronunciation tips:

• Swahili vowels are usually pure and consistent:
  • a as in father
  • e as in bed but cleaner
  • i as in machine
  • o as in told but without a glide
  • u as in rule
• mw in Mwalimu is pronounced together, not as two separate syllables.
• Stress is usually on the second-to-last syllable of a word:
  • mwaLImu
  • alituambia? Actually in natural speech this verb is often stressed near the end as Swahili penultimate stress applies to the whole word.
  • tuheSAbu
  • siLAbi
  • NEno
  • HIli
  • saUti

English uses to before a verb in this kind of structure, but Swahili often does not.

Instead, Swahili uses the subjunctive verb form:

• alituambia tuhesabu

This already contains the idea of told us to count. So the meaning of English to is built into the grammar of tuhesabu, rather than being shown by a separate word.

The overall order is:

• Mwalimu = the teacher
• alituambia = told us
• tuhesabu = that we count / to count
• silabi za neno hili = the syllables of this word
• kwa sauti = aloud

So the pattern is roughly:

Subject + verb + subordinate verb + object + adverbial phrase

That is a very natural Swahili sentence pattern.