Category: Learning German

Tip 1. Always Learn New Words In Their Natural EnvironmentIn German, you’ll undoubtably be presented with some mind-boggling grammar early on. Don’t fret. The German language gets significantly easier once you’ve scaled the first few conceptual mountains. As you probably know, German nouns are either masculine, feminine or neuter: der, […]

The German personal pronoun “es” is the English equivalent of “it” and has similar functions. It is mostly a substitute for a noun and can: Act as a subject, therefore be in the nominative case.   As a subject es can be placed either before or after the verb.Es donnert in der Ferne – It […]

ENGLISH “WHEN” CAN BE EXPRESSED IN GERMAN BY THREE DIFFERENT WORDS: ALS, WANN, AND WENN. IN THE PAST TENSE, “WHEN” IS USUALLY ALS: “ALS ER GESTERN ANKAM,…” = “WHEN HE ARRIVED YESTERDAY,…” BUT HERE WE WILL CONCENTRATE ON THE TWO GERMAN “W” WORDS FOR “WHEN.” Check out the following examples: […]

There really are three German verbs that can be translated as “to know” in English! But German-speakers don’t really have to worry about it, and you won’t either after you’ve covered this lesson. The two main German verbs that mean “to know” are kennen and wissen. A third verb, können, […]

Unfortunately, there are much more than ten mistakes you can make in German! However, we want to concentrate on the top ten kinds of mistakes that beginning students of German are likely to make. But before we get to that, think about this: How is learning a second languagedifferent from […]

PREPOSITIONS (PRÄPOSITIONEN) ARE A HAZARDOUS AREA IN THE LEARNING OF ANY SECOND LANGUAGE, AND GERMAN IS NO EXCEPTION. THESE SHORT, SEEMINGLY INNOCENT WORDS — AN, AUF, BEI, BIS, IN, MIT, ÜBER, UM, ZU, AND OTHERS — CAN OFTEN BE GEFÄHRLICH (DANGEROUS). ONE OF THE MOST COMMON MISTAKES MADE BY THE […]

Although German is a straightforward language once you learn the rules, you can’t always directly translate every word from English. In fact, the more you study some words, the more confusing they may become. Including prepositions.  Three German prepositions in particular can be tricky: in, an and auf. REFRESHER: WHAT […]

Knowing when to use the dative and accusative in a German sentence is a major hurdle for many students. Equally as important is the sentence structure when using the accusative and dative cases. Compared to English, there are more options, depending on your word choice.For instance, “I’m giving the mouse […]

  The German verb lassen is a very useful irregular (strong) verb with the basic meaning of “to allow” or “to let.” But it has many other meanings and is used often in everyday German.   COMMON VERB COMBINATIONS   The verb lassen is also found in several common verbal phrases. Under the new spelling rules, […]

One of the things that can make translating other languages difficult for many is that the rules of grammar change with each language. Knowing the correct word order can be difficult if you don’t understand the rules o the language you’re learning. In English adverbs usually come after prepositions but in […]