Use of Dative after учить etc?

Question

I've always had trouble figuring out why the dative is used in such constructions: Я учу драконов русскому языку каждый день—вот беда моя! So why is the verb учить followed by an accusative object then the dative? Is the literal meaning something like, "I'm teaching dragons FOR the Russian language", with FOR meaning "after, in the way of, for the purposes of" The base meaning of Dative is " to, for". Most people translate Dative always as "to" but "for" works way better in my opinion. мне холондо—is more "it's cold for me" that it is "it's cold to me". If it's not what I suggested, wtf is going on with these teaching/ learning verbs выучивать, приучивать итд...

Answer 1

Hello, it's actually a fairly simple answer. With the verb учить - научить (to teach) you just have to memorize the format кого - чему? You don't need to think of a literal translation why dative? Isn't it like in the situation мне холодно which means to me is cold? No... There are a lot of times where a direct translation doesn't make sense, you just need to memorize the respective cases.

So in this instance, following the verb учить you must have кого (Genitive) - who and then чему(Dative) - what? For example, the sentence 'teach me something new' would be 'научи(те) меня(Genitive) чему то новому(Dative). In your example, драконов (genitive plural) русскому языку (dative)

Hope this helps!