For information about how to do Lessons 2 – 71, please read How to Use this Book.
Note – to aid memorization, words and examples can be hidden by selecting "hide all" or by selecting individually.
Vocabulary
sino
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who
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gurò
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teacher
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lalaki
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man
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pangulo
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president
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at
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and
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estudyante
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student
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babae
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woman
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mga
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plural marker
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Sir
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Mr.
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nanay
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mother
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*sinó- sinó
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who (used with plurals)
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* no need to memorize
Grammar
In this lesson, we will learn to ask questions with “who”, which is sino in Tagalog. For a complete list of Tagalog question words, see Appendix K. We will also use this lesson as our introduction to Tagalog sentences and the ang form. If you are not familiar with ang form noun markers, or need a refresher, please go to Appendix A and memorize them before attempting this lesson.
Here is a little review of English grammar. The subject of a sentence is the person/thing that is doing or being something. The predicate is the rest of the sentence. For more English grammar definitions, please see Appendix M.
Sino + subject? (Tag.) = Who is the subject? (Eng.)
Note: Subject takes ang form.
In this book, the equation shown in big text above is called a Structure Equation. Terms like “Structure Equation” and abbreviations that are unique to this book can be found in Appendix N.
Ex: Sino ang guro?
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= Who is the teacher?
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Ex: Sino ang mga lalaki?
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= Who are the men?
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Ex: Sino ang pangulo?
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= Who is the president?
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To answer these questions, you can use the following:
Predicate + subject. (Tag.) = Subject is the predicate. (Eng.)
Note: Subject and predicate take ang form.
Ans: Si Mrs. Castillo ang guro.
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= The teacher is Mrs. Castillo.
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Ans: Sina Joshua at Joaquin ang mga lalaki.
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= The men are Joshua and Joaquin.
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Ans: Si Sir Bautista ang pangulo.
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= The president is Mr. Bautista.
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Remember that direct family member nouns, like nanay, are usually marked by the same noun markers that mark names.
Ex: Si nanay ang guro.
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= The teacher is mother.
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Extra: Sino-sino
There is a special word for “who” that is used with plurals. It is sino-sino, or sinu-sino. Here is an example:
Ex: Sino-sino ang mga lalaki?
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= Who are the men?
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It is good to be able to recognize this, but it is not used very often in colloquial speech. You are better off using sino, so we will not mention sino-sino again.
This is not all - we will go deeper into sino in later lessons.
Sample sentences
Q1
Who are the teachers?
Sino ang mga guro?
Q2
The teachers are Mr. Santos and Mrs. Castillo.
Sina Sir Santos at Mrs. Castillo ang mga guro.
Q3
Who is the man?
Sino ang lalaki?
Q4
The man is Joaquin.
Si Joaquin ang lalaki.
Q5
Who are the presidents?
Sino ang mga pangulo?
Q6
The presidents are Mrs. Cruz and Mr. Bautista.
Sina Mrs. Cruz at Sir Bautista ang mga pangulo.
Q7
Who is the student?
Sino ang estudyante?
Q8
The student is Angel.
Si Angel ang estudyante.
Q9
Who is the woman?
Sino ang babae?
Q10
The woman is Mother.
Si nanay ang babae.
Drills – Lesson 2