How long an action lasts

Structure Verb + (了) + duration

The duration of an action ("I studied for THREE YEARS") goes AFTER the verb, not before: 我学了三年中文. This clashes with English word order. Here the duration block works like a complement of the verb. With an object, you usually repeat the verb or place the duration before the object.

Examples

我wǒ学xué了le三sān年nián中zhōng文wén。
I studied Chinese for three years.
他tā睡shuì了le八bā个ge小xiǎo时shí。
He slept for eight hours.
我wǒ等děng了le半bàn个ge小xiǎo时shí。
I waited for half an hour.

Levels are indicative: they follow the standard Chinese Grammar Wiki (AllSet Learning) progression, not an official HSK 3.0 mapping. We never assign levels by eye.

This point and the other 370, with audio on every example, inside Wanyu.