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Eles têm corações grandes.

Eles têm corações grandes.
They have big hearts.
From Lesson 40:Plurals ending in -ão (-ões, -ãos, -ães)·Portuguese (Portugal)

Breakdown of Eles têm corações grandes.

eles
they (m)
ter
to have
grande
big / large
o coração
the heart

Questions & Answers about Eles têm corações grandes.

Why does the plural of coração end in -ões?
In Portuguese, most nouns ending in -ão form their plural by changing to -ões. So, coração (heart) becomes corações (hearts). While you will learn some words that change to -ãos or -ães, -ões is by far the most common pattern to remember.
In the singular word coração, the squiggly line (tilde) is on the 'a'. Why does it move in corações?
The tilde (~) marks a nasal sound. In the singular coração, the nasal sound is on the ã. When the ending changes to -ões for the plural, the nasal sound happens on the õ, so the tilde moves there to show you exactly how to pronounce it.
Why is there a little hat (circumflex accent) on têm?
That accent shows that the verb is plural! Eles têm means 'they have'. If it were singular ('he has' or 'she has'), it would be written without the accent: ele tem or ela tem. They sound almost exactly the same, so the accent is a helpful visual clue for reading and writing.
Why does grandes come after corações, and why does it have an 's'?
In Portuguese, describing words (adjectives) usually come right after the noun they describe. Also, because corações is plural, the adjective must be plural too. Since the singular word grande ends in an 'e', it doesn't have separate masculine or feminine forms; we just add an -s to make it grandes.

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