Learn Turkish: Öğretmen neden kızgın? - Why is the teacher angry?

In Turkish, for the third person (he, she, or it), the 'to be' verb is often left completely invisible in everyday speech. Kızgın means 'angry,' but here it acts as 'is angry.'

Why isn't there a word for 'the' before öğretmen?

Turkish doesn't have a specific word for 'the.' A noun like öğretmen can mean 'teacher,' 'a teacher,' or 'the teacher' depending entirely on the context of the conversation.

Is it okay to put neden at the beginning of the sentence like we do in English?

Yes, you could say Neden öğretmen kızgın? because Turkish word order is very flexible. However, it usually sounds more natural to put the question word right before the adjective or verb it relates to, which is why neden is in the middle here.

How does this question relate to the lesson's focus on çünkü (because)?

Neden is the question word for 'why.' Whenever someone asks you a question using neden, you will use çünkü (because) to answer it! For example, you might answer: Çünkü öğrenciler gürültülü (Because the students are noisy).