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Questions & Answers about Я читаю учебник.
Why didn't the ending of учебник change if it is the direct object receiving the action?
Because учебник (textbook) is a masculine INANIMATE noun (a non-living thing). In Russian, when an inanimate masculine noun is the direct object of a sentence, its Accusative form looks exactly the same as its Nominative (dictionary) form. It receives the action, but its spelling stays exactly the same!
Does читаю mean 'I read' or 'I am reading'?
It can mean both! Russian does not have a separate continuous tense like English does. The single word читаю covers both 'I read' (something you do regularly) and 'I am reading' (something you are doing right now).
Why is the verb form читаю here instead of читать?
Because the subject of the sentence is Я (I). To match the subject, we take the dictionary form читать (to read) and change the ending to match 'I', giving us читаю.
How do we know to translate this as 'the textbook' instead of 'a textbook'?
Russian does not have words for 'a' or 'the'. Depending on the conversation, учебник could mean 'a textbook' or 'the textbook'. We used 'the' in the English translation because it sounds natural, but 'a textbook' is also perfectly valid.