отвлекаться
“отвлекаться” (otvlekatsya) — to get distracted in Russian. Verb, level B1. V doroge on otvlyoksya i proekhal svoyu ostanovku — "on the way he got distracted and missed his stop" — the thought walks off sideways; from vlech, to pull: the attention got dragged away, and the toy that distracts a child is the same trick. In a live sentence: “В дороге он отвлёкся и проехал свою остановку” — On the way he got distracted and missed his stop.
In short
| Written in Russian | отвлекаться |
| Read in Latin letters | otvlekatsya |
| Translation | to get distracted |
| Part of speech | verb |
| Level | B1 |
Why it looks that way
V doroge on otvlyoksya i proekhal svoyu ostanovku — "on the way he got distracted and missed his stop" — the thought walks off sideways; from vlech, to pull: the attention got dragged away, and the toy that distracts a child is the same trick.
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- В дороге он отвлёкся и проехал свою остановкуV doroge on otvlyoksya i proekhal svoyu ostanovkuOn the way he got distracted and missed his stop
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “to get distracted” in Russian?
«отвлекаться», read “otvlekatsya”. In a live sentence: “В дороге он отвлёкся и проехал свою остановку” — On the way he got distracted and missed his stop. Verb, level B1; written with the characters о, т, в, л, е, к, а, т, ь, с, я.
How is “отвлекаться” written in Latin letters?
otvlekatsya. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
V doroge on otvlyoksya i proekhal svoyu ostanovku — "on the way he got distracted and missed his stop" — the thought walks off sideways; from vlech, to pull: the attention got dragged away, and the toy that distracts a child is the same trick. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.