Learn how to use the imperative verb form
Now Playing: Lesson Audio
Get a breakdown of the dialogue and translations instantly with the Premium line-by-line Audio. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
| INTRODUCTION |
| Gina: Hi everyone, Gina here! Welcome to FinnishPod101.com! This is Absolute Beginner Season 1 , Lesson 13 - Give Me a Lesson in Finnish! |
| Paula: Hei! Minä olen Paula. I’m Paula. |
| Gina: In this lesson, you’ll learn to order people around. Finally, you can get bossy in Finnish! |
| Paula: Or maybe you can just give someone friendly instructions. |
| Gina: Well, that’s up to you, listeners. We provide the tools, you do what you want with them! |
| Paula: This conversation takes place at home. Emmi and Helen are just about to leave the house, and Jussi is hanging around. They will be speaking in standard Finnish. |
| Gina: Okay. Let's listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Emmi: Tule jo! |
| Helen: Odota vähän, puen vain takin. |
| Emmi: Jussi, anna tuo kirja. |
| Jussi: Ole hyvä. |
| Emmi: Kiitos. |
| Jussi: Älä unohda puhelinta. |
| Gina: Let's hear the conversation one time slowly. |
| Emmi: Tule jo! |
| Helen: Odota vähän, puen vain takin. |
| Emmi: Jussi, anna tuo kirja. |
| Jussi: Ole hyvä. |
| Emmi: Kiitos. |
| Jussi: Älä unohda puhelinta. |
| Gina: Now let's hear it with the English translation. |
| Emmi: Tule jo! |
| Gina: Come already! |
| Helen: Odota vähän, puen vain takin. |
| Gina: Wait a little, I'll just put on my jacket. |
| Emmi: Jussi, anna tuo kirja. |
| Gina: Jussi, give me that book. |
| Jussi: Ole hyvä. |
| Gina: Here you are. |
| Emmi: Kiitos. |
| Gina: Thank you. |
| Jussi: Älä unohda puhelinta. |
| Gina: Don't forget your phone. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Gina: Emmi and Helen seem to be in a hurry. Where do you think they’re going? |
| Paula: Oh, I don’t know. They could be going to school, or maybe they’re going to see some of Emmi’s friends. |
| Gina: Do Finns usually turn up at the time they’re supposed to? I mean, the requirement for punctuality varies quite a lot in different cultures. |
| Paula: Well, I’d say that yes, Finns do expect people to be quite punctual. Of course, it also depends on the situation - if you’re late for a business meeting it’s worse than being late for a meeting with a friend. |
| Gina: Of course. If you’re late for a business meeting, would that mean you just lost your client? |
| Paula: No, I don’t think so. But it doesn’t make a good impression, so it’s better to be safe than sorry. |
| Gina: Okay. Let’s move on to the vocabulary. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Gina: The first word we shall see is: |
| Paula: Tulla [natural native speed] |
| Gina: To come |
| Paula: Tulla [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Tulla [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Jo [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Already |
| Paula: Jo [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Jo [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Odottaa [natural native speed] |
| Gina: To wait |
| Paula: Odottaa [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Odottaa [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Vähän [natural native speed] |
| Gina: A bit, a little, a few |
| Paula: Vähän [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Vähän [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Pukea [natural native speed] |
| Gina: To put on (clothes), to dress (someone) |
| Paula: Pukea [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Pukea [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Vain [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Only, just |
| Paula: Vain [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Vain [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Takki [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Jacket, coat |
| Paula: Takki [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Takki [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Antaa [natural native speed] |
| Gina: To give |
| Paula: Antaa [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Antaa [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Unohtaa [natural native speed] |
| Gina: To forget |
| Paula: Unohtaa [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Unohtaa [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next: |
| Paula: Puhelin [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Telephone |
| Paula: Puhelin [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Puhelin [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Gina: Let's take a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Paula: The first word is ‘vähän’, which means “a little” or “a few” in Finnish. |
| Gina: So it can be used both with things you can count, and with things you can’t count? I mean, in English “a little” is used with things you can’t count and “a few” is used with things you can count. |
| Paula: That’s right. If you use it with something that can’t be counted, the thing will be in singular, for example ‘vähän teetä ‘“a little tea”, but if you use it with something that can be counted, for example ‘vähän lautasia’ “a few plates”, the things will be in plural. |
| Gina: I see. What’s our next word? |
| Paula: The next word is ‘pukea’. |
| Gina: And that means “to put on clothes?” |
| Paula: Yeah, but you have to be a bit careful. You can’t use it as the translation of “to get dressed”. |
| Gina: Hmm, that seems tricky. So what’s the difference? |
| Paula: The difference is that with ‘pukea’, you have to specify either the piece of clothing that is put on or the person who is being dressed. So you can say ‘Helen pukee takin päälle’ - “Helen puts on the jacket” or ‘äiti pukee lapsen’ - “the mother dresses the child”. But if you want to say “Helen gets dressed” meaning that Helen puts on all the clothes she needs, you’d use a different verb. |
| Gina: I see. And what’s our next word? |
| Paula: Our last word is ‘takki’. It covers both “jackets” and “coats” in English, and some other things as well. Basically, ‘takki’ can be about anything that’s worn on top of other clothes on the upper body, has sleeves, and can be opened from the front. |
| Gina: Well, that sure is quite a wide definition. |
| Paula: ‘Takki’ also appears in a number of compound words, such as ‘villatakki’ meaning “cardigan”, ‘aamutakki’ meaning “dressing gown”, and ‘sadetakki’ meaning “rain coat”. |
| Gina: Keep that in mind, listeners! Now it’s time for the grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Gina: In this lesson, you're going to learn how to give orders or instructions in Finnish. |
| Paula: In Finnish, the form of an imperative verb, in other words, giving instructions, will be different depending on who is supposed to do the action. Just like verbs take personal endings in basic statements, they also take personal endings in the imperative. |
| Gina: But in this lesson, we’ll only be looking at the form you use to tell the person you’re talking to, to do something. |
| Paula: And I can tell you that if you’ve been listening to our earlier lessons, and reading the lesson notes, that’s really a piece of cake. |
| Gina: Okay, so how do you do it? |
| Paula: Well, in the lesson notes you always have the stem listed for each verb. So far, you’ve been adding the personal endings to these stems to get the verb forms used in basic statements. But for the second person singular imperative, you only need the stem, nothing else. |
| Gina: That’s it? Just the stem? |
| Paula: That’s it. Let’s take, for example, the verb ‘tulla’, “to come”. The stem is ‘tule-’, so that’s also the second person imperative ‘-tule’. The imperative of the negation verb ‘ei’ is irregular, though. ‘Et\ becomes ‘älä’. |
| Gina: Sounds simple enough. So how do you say, “come tomorrow”? |
| Paula: ‘Tule huomenna.’ The statement “You will come tomorrow” would be ‘Sinä tulet huomenna’, but when you use the imperative, you shouldn’t include a subject in the sentence. In statements, subjects are optional, but in the imperative, they should be left out. |
| Gina: OK. How would you say “give me that apple”? |
| Paula: Anna tuo omena. |
| Gina: Hmm... Didn’t we just learn in lesson 12 that we should have a genitive object here? I do want the entire apple, not just a part of it. |
| Paula: That’s a good point. The statement “You will give that apple” would be ‘Sinä annat tuon omenan,’ but in the imperative, any objects that would normally be in the genitive, are in the nominative instead. If you did want only some of the apple, the apple would be in the partitive case, just like we learned in the previous lesson - Anna tuota omenaa means “Give me some of that apple”. |
| Gina: Let’s have one more example. How would you say “Take the mug”? |
| Paula: The statement “You take the mug” would be ‘Sinä otat mukin’, and the imperative is ‘Ota muki’. |
| Gina: Okay. Listeners, it’s quiz time. I’ll give you a command in English, and your job is to translate it into Finnish. Paula will give you the correct answer in a few seconds. |
| Paula: I think I’ll also give you some hints... I’ll give you the corresponding statement in Finnish, so all you need to do is remove the subject and the personal ending from the verb. |
| Gina: Here’s the first one - “wait for me!” |
| Paula: The corresponding statement “You will wait for me” is ‘Sinä odotat minua’ . |
| --- |
| Paula: Odota minua! |
| Gina: Okay, here’s the next one - “don’t forget!” |
| Paula: The corresponding statement, “You will not forget” is ‘Sinä et unohda.’ |
| --- |
| Paula: Älä unohda! |
| Gina: Well done! Paula, why don’t we run quickly through the imperative verbs we had in this lesson? |
| Paula: Sure. We had ‘tule’ “come”, ‘odota’ “wait”, ‘anna’ “give”, ‘ota’ “take”, ‘ole’ “be”, and ‘älä unohda’ which means “don’t forget”. We have many more examples and a lot more information in the lesson notes, so listeners, be sure to check them out. |
Outro |
|---|
| Gina: That’s it for this lesson. Thanks for listening, and see you next time! |
| Paula: Hei hei! |
Comments
HideAre you a punctual person?
Hei Victor,
Thank you for your sentence! It is very much correct except you can change "Ei" to "En ole". 👍
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Ei, olen usein myöhässä. (I don't know if it's correct 🤔)
Hei Laura,
Kiitos kommentistasi! Ajattelet samoin kuin suomalaiset yleensä. 😄 "Kyllä, minä aina aikaisin (mionä olen aina ajoissa) 😄 Kuulin lapsena aina "15 minuuttia etuajassa on ajoissia, ajoissa on myöhässä"."
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Kyllä, minä aina aikaisin 😄 Kuulin lapsena aina "15 minuuttia etuajassa on ajoissia, ajoissa on myöhässä".
Hei Elena,
Kiitos kommentistasi! Lauseesi on aivan oikein. 👍
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hei, olen todella täsmällinen ja tykkään aina olla ajoissa. 😄
Moikka Jimena,
Thank you for your informative comment! Just a small correction is needed. "Olen täsmällinen." Have fun studying Finnish! 😄
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Moikka!
Olen tääsmällinen. Tykkään olla ajoissa. Se on kunnioittavaa.
Suomalaiset ihmiset ovat aina ajoissa. 👍
Meskikolainen kulttuuri on erilainen. Suurimman osan ajasta olemme myöhässä
Hei Adel,
Kiitos virheettömästä kommentistasi. Osaat suomea todella hyvin. Suomalainen hyve on olla aina ajoissa paikalla.😄
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
En pidä odottamisesta ja sitten yritän olla ajoissa niin muut eivät odota minua.
Hello Ilsa Lottes,
Thank you for your comments and questions. I understand perfectly your need to practice more grammar. We have often quizzes with our self-study-based lessons. Does this help you a bit? Then we offer also teaching services and other tools with our Premium Plus subscription. Is that worth considering in your case?
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
In my comments I have repeatedly asked for more practice with grammar. I think I have been hesitant to do some of this practice on my own like others have done. I realize now that I can do this practice on my own. I hope to get the confidence to do this soon. This will be difficult but should increase my learning.
I get the general idea of the lessons so far and can memorize the vocabulary words. But I doubt that I can apply what I learn without practice. Are there practice exercises for the grammar. Grammar is so different from English and I need some drill.
Hei Danica,
Thank you for your comment. 😇
Feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
We wish you good luck with your language studies.
Kind regards,
Levente
Team FinnishPod101.com
She wasn’t mad...except I send her a rude email that I didn’t think was rude...also at 7:23pm...and my mom was like you can’t do that! (My friend Jessica did it. She told the teacher to stop giving her advice and talking about her project) So I’ll just ask her questions now. I learned, though!
Hello Danica,
Thank you for your comment! Hopefully, you and your teacher will be less mad at you and there will be a mutual understanding of everything. We hope you enjoy learning Finnish with us. 😄
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
My teacher is punctual and wants us to be punctual...Normally the teacher would say I’ll see you at 7. Today, though, she said I’ll see you at the STROKE of seven. I can tell she’s mad at me...I’ll hit join right when the clock hits 7.😉
Hello Danica,
Thank you for your question. In Finnish, you don't necessarily need to add the word "kiitos" to be polite. Naturally, it is even more polite to use it. So, both sentences are OK to use. Hope this helps. 😄
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Moi,
With Saisinko salattia, (May I have some salad please) why isn’t kittos at the end. Or whatever means please? Like if you said may I please have some salad.
Hello Danica,
Thank you for your question! Yes, "ole hyvä" means you're welcome, so, you got it right! 👍 Being on time is a virtue. Keep it that way, Danica. ❤️️
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com