Çocuklar hayvanat bahçesine gitti.

The children went to the zoo.

Breakdown of Çocuklar hayvanat bahçesine gitti.

• gitmek: to go
• çocuk: the child
• hayvanat bahçesi: a zoo

Questions & Answers about Çocuklar hayvanat bahçesine gitti.

Why is çocuklar plural, and what does -lar mean?

Çocuklar means children. The base word is çocuk = child.

The ending -lar / -ler is the regular Turkish plural suffix:

• çocuk = child
• çocuklar = children

Which form you use, -lar or -ler, depends on vowel harmony. Since çocuk has back vowels, it takes -lar.

Why is hayvanat bahçesine so long? What parts is it made of?

It has several pieces:

• hayvanat bahçesi = zoo
• hayvanat bahçesine = to the zoo

More literally:

• hayvanat = animals / animal kingdom (an older, somewhat formal element)
• bahçe = garden
• bahçesi = its garden / animal garden

So hayvanat bahçesi is literally something like animal garden, which is the Turkish expression for zoo.

Then Turkish adds the dative ending -e / -a, meaning to:

• hayvanat bahçesi = the zoo
• hayvanat bahçesine = to the zoo

Why is there an n in bahçesine?