Russian Grammar

Welcome to our introductory course to Russian grammar. These lessons will teach you all the basic concepts you need to know in an effective and fun way, including lots of useful audio recordings and downloadable PDF files.

As you are reading this, you are most certainly intended to study the Russian language. Be it for business, out of interest to Russian culture, or if you have to because you’re going to Russia – the purpose after all is the same: You’ll want to speak, read and understand Russian.

Lesson	Language material	Word groups
Getting acquainted .	Set phrases for getting acquainted. Sentence stress and intonation. Consonant changes in speech flow. Nouns. Three genders. Nominative and Accusative cases.	Acquaintance, politeness formulae.
Personal information	Personal pronouns. Possession. Verb omission and most important verbs. Genitive case. Present tense, verb forms. Sentence structure and word order.	Work, job, profession, relatives.
Countries and nations	Nationalities, countries, general questions. Grammar information – adjectives, nationalities. Capital letters, spelling.	Countries, nations, languages.
Visiting Russia	Past tense. Verb groups, rules and exceptions.	Russia, cities, travel.
Speaking Russian	Degrees of comparison. Adverbs	Adverbs and adjectives
Where to go	Case system. Dative, Prepositional, Instrumentative cases.	Directions, places of interest.
What to eat	Future tense. Shortened adjectives.	Food types, meals.
Telling friends about Russia	Past and present tense. Verb systems. Indirect speech.	Historic events, general words, business and modern terms.
Famous people	Participle. Sentence structure. Participial constructions.	Business terms, culture terms
Traditions and customs	Speech realia. Country information. Mostly cultural lesson.	Realia
Appendix	Hard and soft vowels. Personal Pronouns. Consonant changes. Spelling rules. Countries and nationalitites. Noun declensions. Numerals. Prepositions with different cases. Declension of adjectives.

Some people say that the Russian language is one of the most difficult languages in the world. This might be true. It has its own alphabet, lots of grammar difficulties and exceptions. Some things like «да нет наверное» (which means something like “probably not”) or some idioms are really hard to understand. But there is no language in the world that cannot be learnt if you really want to.

To begin with, here are some tips and other useful information that might help you while learning Russian:

You need to know the purpose you are learning a language for. You will require this not only to motivate you but also to identify the key points, word groups and extra information you will need while learning. You will never be able to know ALL of the words of the language –Russians themselves do not. You rather need to have a goal and you need to have steps that will allow you to reach it.
Speak, read and listen. This course is intended to help you in learning, but it is never enough. The best way of learning the language is to go to a Russian speaking country and immerse yourself in the language, but if you do not have such an opportunity you still have the Internet. You can chat with people, watch movies and read. It might seem difficult during the first steps at learning but if you really WANT to know the language, you will find it easier with every step. In general, Russian people are glad to hear someone wants to learn their language and will help you with all the information.
Do not give up! Sooner or later it would seem that you understand nothing or the words you remembered seem to be forgotten, and the rules seem to be created just to mess you up. It is normal to have such a stage. But if you give up – what was it for? You wasted your time and money for nothing? You give up the idea of learning the language? The author of this course knows 8 foreign languages and can assure you that it comes with each of them. But if you do not give up, the world of the language will open before you in new colours.
Do not be afraid of mistakes. Many people make mistakes in their speech even if it is their native language, and they still can understand each other. Of course this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to avoid them. Try to correct them, but never be afraid of them.
Remember that any language is a means of communication and this is its most important function. Your primary goal is to convey information, and all the rules and words serve that purpose. So, to learn how to communicate you should communicate and talk and understand.

Try to remember this and good luck in learning Russian!

Before you start, we highly recommend you to read our introduction to the Russian alphabet and its pronunciation, as well as our post about the Russian language and culture. They will teach you some useful basics to prepare you for your next steps towards speaking and understanding the Russian language.