nasıl - how

Nasıl is the 40th most common word in Turkish and it is an interrogative word, that is we use it to form a question sentence.

In this article we will learn to form these kind of sentences;
I know how to...
How to ... ?
How...?
How + adj. ! (e.g.How beautiful house!)

First maybe we should learn what we can not say :) How old, How long, How much, How often... In Turkish we have different words for these. If you want to read the other interrogative words in Turkish you may like to see link. 

In Turkish, you build "How to" sentences with this word and also you change the verb from active to passive sound usually adding the ending -ıl,-il. to the verb stem (the verb after you take away mek,mak) And the objects in the sentence take the same endings as the normal sentences. For example;

at: horse; binmek: to ride 

When you use this verb you add the suffix "to" in English to the objects which is -e,-a in Turkish 

Ata biniyorum. I am riding a horse. 

Ata nasıl binilir? / Nasıl ata binilir? How to ride a horse? (You can say nasıl first or in the middle)

And when you want to say "I know how to ... " You use the present continuous form of the verb "to know/bilmek" and you add -yı,-yi after you take away -k from the verb.*(Please see the below)

Ata binmeyi biliyorum. I know to ride a horse. 

You could also say "how to ride"+ biliyorum

Ata nasıl binilir biliyorum. / I know how to ride a horse.

But it sounds like you put emphasis, your audience did not believe you first or they did not think it was highly possible. So, in Turkish we prefer to say "know to do" and "to know verb+ing" instead of "to know how to" unless we need to put emphasize.

Examples for "how to" and "I  know how to"

Nasıl yemek yapılır? How to cook? (yemek yapmak/to cook,to make food)

Nasıl (bir) website yapılır? How to make a webpage? (yapmak/to make)
Nasıl yüzülür? How to swim? (yüzmek/to swim)
Nasıl kilo verilir? How to lose weight? (kilo vermek/to lose weight)
Nasıl Türkçe öğrenilir? How to learn Turkish? (öğrenmek/to learn)

Yemek yapmayı biliyorum. I know cooking.
Website yapmayı biliyorum. I know to make a website.
Yüzmeyi biliyorum. I know swimming.

Other examples

Nasılsın? How are you?
Nasıl gidiyor? How it is going? (works like "how are you?/nasılsın?")
Nasıl biliyorsun bunu? How come you know this?
Yolculuğun nasıldı? How was your trip?
Film nasıldı? How was the movie?
Günün nasıldı? How was your day?
Nasıl Türkçe öğrendin? How did you learn Turkish?
Nasıl yaptın bunu? How did you do this?
Nasıl kilo verdin? How did you lose weight?
Yüzmeyi nasıl öğrendin? How did you learn to swim?
Bunu nasıl yaptın? How did you do this?
Tell me how you are. Söyle bana nasılsın / Bana nasıl olduğunu söyle.

How beautiful house! / What a beautiful house!
(Nasıl (da) güzel bir ev! / Ne güzel (bir) ev!)
For these kind of sentences, In Turkish we usually prefer to say "what.." , nasıl/how unless we want to put emphasis or we are so much surprised or impressed. When you start with "nasıl da", you put even more emphasis. The grammar is easy, you just say nasıl/ne and the rest is a normal sentence.
You do not need to say a/bir before the adjective in Turkish but you are free to say, the sentence means the same with or without.
examples:
Ne berbat film! How horrible movie!
Ne şirin kedicik! What a cute kitten!
Ne büyük ev! What a big house!




*Note: Why yi? Because we always use -ı,i ending with the verb bilmek and when you take away -k it ends with a vowel, so we need to add -y also. For example; Seni biliyorum/I know you, Ayşe'yi biliyorum/I know Ayşe.