birer birer
“birer birer” — one by one in Turkish. Phrase, level A2. birer is "one each", and the doubling strengthens it: one by one, singly. ikişer ikişer, two by two, is built the same way. In a live sentence: “Çocuklar birer birer içeri girdi” — The children came inside one by one. You can hear how it sounds right here. A word from the everyday Turkish course, level A2.
In short
| Written in Turkish | birer birer |
| Translation | one by one |
| Part of speech | phrase |
| Level | A2 |
- birer birerone by one
Why it looks that way
birer is "one each", and the doubling strengthens it: one by one, singly. ikişer ikişer, two by two, is built the same way.
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.
- Çocuklar birer birer içeri girdiThe children came inside one by one
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 “one by one” in Turkish?
«birer birer». In a live sentence: “Çocuklar birer birer içeri girdi” — The children came inside one by one. You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Phrase, level A2.
Why does this word look the way it does?
birer is "one each", and the doubling strengthens it: one by one, singly. ikişer ikişer, two by two, is built the same way. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how it sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.