Уро́к 4
4.3 Grammar: ‘On’ a day…
Люби́мая Грамма́тика
To say that you do something ‘on’ a particular day of the week, you have to use the preposition ‘в’ (yes, that’s right, ‘в’ – the one that literally means ‘in’) + the day of the week. There’s a catch. You DON’T use the Prepositional Case after the preposition here (WHAT?!). Instead, you use the Accusative Case. No, you don’t that one yet, but you’re about to. We’ll start here, nice and easy. This is what it looks like for saying ON A DAY OF THE WEEK:
| День – Day | В день – On (that) day |
| понеде́льник – Monday | в понеде́льник – on Monday |
| вто́рник – Tuesday | во вто́рник – on Tuesday |
| среда́ – Wednesday | в сре́ду – on Wednesday |
| четве́рг – Thursday | в четве́рг – on Thursday |
| пя́тница – Friday | в пя́тницу – on Friday |
| суббо́та – Saturday | в суббо́ту – on Saturday |
| воскресе́нье – Sunday | в воскресе́нье – on Sunday |
The RULES:
What’s going on? How do you get from the day itself to ‘on that day’? Can you deduce a rule or generalization? So, 3 of the 7 days have a change from an -а ending an -у ending. What do those three have in common? YES!!!! Those three ARE all feminine! Молодец! So, to say ON A DAY, you use the preposition ‘в’ + the day of the week (in Accusative Case).
**We’ll get into Accusative Case specifics in the next module. For today, JUST LEARN THIS.**
If the day happens to be feminine, the ending changes from -а to -у. This change happens because you get Accusative Case after this preposition ‘в’ when it’s being used to indicate ‘on’ a day of week. What happens with the masculine and neuter days? NOTHING!
