Section outline

  • Learning outcomes:

    Students will be able to:

    • ask and answer the question ‘how many’ in te reo Māori
    • describe how many people or objects there are in a given scenario

    Asking How many Objects?

    When we want to ask how many objects there are we use the phrase “E hia ngā ……..?” 

    E hia ngā āporo?                       How many apples?
    E rua ngā āporo.                       There are two apples

    If there is only ONE  we would reply “Kotahi te….”

    Kotahi te āporo                          There is only one apple.


    People

    When asking about how many people there are we use ‘Tokohia’ instead of ‘E hia.’


    Tokohia ngā tamariki?              How many children?
    Tokowhā ngā tamariki.             There are four children

    However, we only use “toko” for 2-9 people. 

    For 10 or more people we would just use “E ……...” 
    E tekau mā iwa ngā tamariki     There are 19 children


    If there is only ONE person then we would still reply “Kotahi te……...”
    Kotahi te tamaiti                         There is one child.