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B2 · Upper-intermediate · Lesson 24
Verbal nouns (gerunds)
Turn an action into a thing you can talk about.
A verbal noun makes a noun out of a verb — 'reading', 'learning', 'a meeting'. Form it from the passive-participle stem plus -nie or -cie. These nouns are neuter and decline like any neuter noun.
| Verb | Verbal noun | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| czytać | czytanie | reading |
| uczyć się | uczenie się | learning |
| pić | picie | drinking |
| spotkać | spotkanie | a meeting |
- •-nie / -cie endings; the noun is neuter.
- •Used heavily in formal and written Polish.
Quick check
The verbal noun of 'czytać' is:
-nie forms the verbal noun: czytanie.
Verbal nouns behave like…
They are neuter nouns and decline.
Practice
Now produce the answers yourself — type them, choose the form, or build the sentence.
Verbal noun of 'czytać':
Verbal nouns behave like…
Verbal noun of 'uczyć się':
Say: Reading is my passion.
Reflexive verbal nouns keep…
What this lesson covered
Verbal nouns, or gerunds, let you turn an action into a thing you can talk about — the equivalent of English “-ing” nouns. Polish forms them predictably, usually in -nie or -cie: czytać → czytanie (reading), gotować → gotowanie (cooking), palić → palenie (smoking). Crucially, they're always neuter, which makes their agreement easy to handle. With them you can make an activity the subject or object of a sentence: czytanie jest przyjemne (reading is pleasant), lubię gotowanie (I like cooking), palenie jest zakazane (smoking is forbidden). Reflexive verbs keep their się (uczenie się języków, “learning languages”). This lesson showed how to build and use them, which is especially handy for talking about hobbies, rules and abstract ideas. It's a small, regular pattern that noticeably widens what you can express.