Questions & Answers about Дети читают книги.
I know the word for "child" is ребёнок. Why is it дети here?
Дети means "children". It is the plural form of ребёнок. This is a highly irregular plural in Russian, meaning the word changes completely when it becomes plural, rather than just changing the last letter.
The English translation says "are reading", but I thought читают just meant "they read"?
Russian doesn't have a separate continuous tense like English does with "are reading". The single present tense verb читают can translate to both "they read" (as a habit) and "they are reading" (right now). You just use the context to figure out which one is meant.
Why does the verb читать end in -ют here?
Because the subject is дети (children), we need the third-person plural ("they") form of the verb. For a regular verb like читать (to read), you drop the -ть from the dictionary form and add the "they" ending, which is -ют.
Since "books" is the direct object being read, shouldn't книги be in the accusative case?
It actually is in the accusative case! The dictionary word is книга (book), and its basic plural is книги. In Russian grammar, when an inanimate object (a non-living thing) is plural, its accusative case form is exactly the same as its basic nominative plural form.
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