Learn Serbian

Thursday, October 24, 2019

Serbian 301 - Retelling Story

Marina asking questions in Serbian , Past tense

In Serbian 301 one is practicing to confidently ask and answer questions about some past tense events. This can be practiced in different ways:

talking about your past, or past events in your life
talking about your friends and family and their experiences
retelling a short story that we have previously learnt
retelling an interesting film/book plot

Additionally, you can also practice telling a story based on a suitable song. Let's take Kristing by Zdravko Čolić, for example!

Retelling Story in Serbian - Song

Retelling Story in Serbian

For the sake of understanding here comes a page with the lyrics translation (not the perfect one, though, but you'll get the gist) and now you can practice retelling the story with the following set of exercises:

Retelling Story by asking questions

Now that you know what has actually happen, can you add your questions in the comments below?

Let me start with just a few:

Kada je Zdravko išao na salaš?
Gde je bio salaš?
Šta sve znači "društvo"?
Ko je stajao na vratima?
Šta je petrolejka?

Serbian 201 - Zvati SE in Past Tense

Marina Past tense , past tense in serbian

In the previous post we practiced the phrase "what's your name" or "how are you called" = "kako se zoveš" in Present Tense. Today we are practicing the same phrase but in the past tense with the family vocabulary :)

Zvati se in Past Tense - MATCH

Learning Zvati se in Past

Test with zvati se in Past

Serbian 102 - Word order with SE

Marina Serbian 102 ,

It can be tricky to learn how to cope with some simple sentences and questions when this "se" word shows up. The best way to cope with it is to practice with a set of familiar phrases:

Word order with SE - Learn

Word order with SE - Flashcards

Word order with SE - Match

Serbian 101 - Asking Simple Questions in Serbian

Marina asking questions in Serbian , Serbian 101

Asking Questions about different topics

In the previous posts there are a bunch of exercises to practice asking questions in Serbian. You can find all of them here.

Today, I'll add some exercises for you to practice and play with:

Asking Questions with Ti

Flashcards

Match

Learn

Asking Questions with Vi

Flashcards

Match

Learn

PO- Prefix with Verbs - Serbian 701

Marina Prefixes in Serbian , Serbian 701

One of the common and very productive ways of expanding a verb meaning is the process of "prefixation" in Serbian. While in English this additional meaning is conveyed through use of different tenses or prepositions in phrasal verbs, at a sentence level, in Serbian it is achieved through only one word, at the lexicology level.

Today we are talking about PO- prefix and its meanings.

Meaning of Po- Prefix in Serbian

There are five main meanings of PO- prefix when added to a verb. These are as follows:

making a perfective verb out of an imperfective one: jesti - pojesti
adding up "distributive meaning", often combined with the word "sve": krasti - pokrasti (there will be a special post dedicated to this)
beginning of the action: leteti - poleteti
spatial meaning (additional meaning "over") : bacati - pobacati
action which lasts for a long time: živeti - poživeti