questions

[frigid tinsel]

That webpage is graded at A2 level btw. As in, an A2 should be comfortable going through those videos and text.

I estimate that to be above your level but it's hard to find A1 level stuff.

[lunar lynx]

Kein Ärger wurde von mir empfunden!

[remote bridge]

yes, I can understand it a little, but missing things like “wieder” due to not very strong memory to those words.

[frigid tinsel]

Can you watch the News Articles and feel like you are learning words? Especially after reading the text + definitions?

[remote bridge]

I mainly learn the words by just searching them up (I don’t really like that, it’s tedious and not always reliable)

[frigid tinsel]

I'm just trying to set a goal for you, if you don't mind lol. Don't feel any pressure to actually do that because some people find the news boring.

[remote bridge]

Or vocab lists.

[frigid tinsel]

I'd suggest buying A1 or A1-A2 graded readers like Café in Berlin.

And also the accompanying .mp3 read along.

[remote bridge]

Perhaps. I have another 3 German classes if I wanna learn more. Mostly here to ask about missed things im not getting.

Finding out what nouns are are a little easier if they’re compound, but if you don’t know what they are or if it isn’t a compound, it’s hard to figure out

[remote bridge]

A2 is way too hard for me, so definitely A1 right now.

[remote bridge]

I feel like I’m in a more worse position because of position testing.

[astral yoke]

position testing? 🤔

[remote bridge]

Placement*

[indigo bear]

You mean looking up words is unreliable? Why do you think so?

[remote bridge]

Many words have different meanings, different contexts. Searching up the word isn’t always going to make you remember it or remember how it’s used until you see it again and then have to repeat the process of searching it up

[indigo bear]

Yes, you have to see a word several times in order to memorise it. That's normal since that's how memory works. But I just found it a bit confusing because you made it sound like looking up a word is unreliable in itself.

Regardless of how you learn the word, by looking it up or seeing it in context, you probably won't remember it the first time. Typically what people say is that you have to see a word on average somewhere around 10 or more times to store it in long term memory (of course it varies by word).

The purpose of looking it up is mainly to make sure you're learning it correctly.

Because it's very easy to "guess wrong" when learning a word from context alone.

[gentle venture]

for instance, i thought that the word grau meant blue, because the i was talking about the sky with someone who was colorblind 🤷

[remote bridge]

I hate how some things are vague. I was expecting B placements to not be that far from A placements. But I didn’t know A placements were like months of learning.

[bold inlet]

Would doing the same thing for German video like Easy german do the trick as well?

[pearl horizon]

how to say cheers auf deutsch

[scenic obsidian]

You can surely look this up yourself

[thin pollen]

Prost I think

[scenic obsidian]

https://www.dict.cc/?s=Cheers

[frigid tinsel]

I mean, it depends on your dedication. Military Linguists, Diplomats, and other "intensive" classes get to B1+ within 6 months or something. But that's making a full time job out of learning German.

If you are hampered by the American high School education system you will be a lot slower lol. Better than nothing but uhhhhh, we Americans suck at this.

[remote bridge]

I’m in German 1 in my school, and they’ve only got like 60% of A1 done but I only have like 3 months left of the class

Yeah I guess we suck haha

[frigid tinsel]

The good news is that you've opened your eyes to the European system of thinking.

[plush locust]

and what are you supposed to be at the end of the class as per curriculum?

[scenic obsidian]

Regardless of country, no school course will ever go as fast as you can go studying by yourself.

Unless you're talking an intensive course that meets 4 hours a day 5 days per week

[scenic obsidian]

That's normal

[frigid tinsel]

The American system has about 5 levels to reach the European equivalent of A2.

[plush locust]

How much time/week (and# of weeks) is one level?

[scenic obsidian]

Again, you think Germans can speak perfect English after 2 years of their English courses?

[frigid tinsel]

Like a semester.

Or more?

I am very far out of high school lol.

[scenic obsidian]

He's asking how many minutes per day, how many days per week is the class

[frigid tinsel]

What I can say is that language learning really gets serious in college.

[scenic obsidian]

If it's college, I'd assume 3x per week, 60 minutes per day?

[frigid tinsel]

Yeah, college courses are either 3 or 4 hours per week + maybe that much homework in addition.

[scenic obsidian]

Which, that's not nothing, but at the same time, if you're a dedicated learner, you can do much more than that on your own

[pearl horizon]

idk if there was a specific way of saying it

[plush locust]

if you want to get good at a language, you also have to (and will, because you want to)

[frigid tinsel]

Yeah, but one semester of USA college is often better than 3 years of high school language.

I'm not sure who set our USA language standards so low, but .... that's how it be.

[remote bridge]

Of course not I just wanna understand

[scenic obsidian]

Consider that the first 2 years of English learning in Germany often happen in like, 3rd grade

There's not a ton happening in those 2 years, either

[remote bridge]

In my school it’s an hour every day every week

[scenic obsidian]

Less, probably

[scenic obsidian]

Oh damn, 5 days a week?

[frigid tinsel]

Oh wow. That's pretty good.

[scenic obsidian]

And they're still only 60% through A1?

Wait, did you just start in January?

[remote bridge]

It’s a high school, I dunno if you guys just have like different systems

[remote bridge]

Nope, like near September I think

[scenic obsidian]

Interesting. How much class time is theory/grammar vs practical practice like practicing speaking?

[remote bridge]

15-25 days per topic. However it’s just the same topic over and over only because it’s to make you memorize. I wouldn’t say it’s repetitive.

[plush locust]

5h/week, since september (obv. with Christmas etc. break)?

[frigid tinsel]

So as a note: a lot of the language learners in Europe attempt the intensive route, which is equivalent to an American military linguist or similar elite.

[remote bridge]

There’s actually not have been a lot of grammar lessons.

[frigid tinsel]

It's a bit of a different world. What we consider elite is almost normal over there.

[remote bridge]

In fact, we’ve only just learned that verbs need to go to the end if they aren’t primary (how)

[scenic obsidian]

Do you just repeat words over and over again, or what?

Definitely sounds like you could learn faster on your own

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKCEuz6wxDQnM6p0MzAKc_stZHGW0tdCB&si=wC26OK7-7_bHZRz6

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKCEuz6wxDQkJNWwZ4uSocD0bLAipquGT&si=Ob7L4dsRDMbJwXAE

[plush locust]

A1 is very much just the foundations (a big chunk is getting used to cases and stuff)

[scenic obsidian]

This YouTube channel explains the grammar and has playlists for each level; I'd recommend watching it

[scenic obsidian]

Doesn't sound like they've even introduced cases yet

[plush locust]

If you, for example, go by the speaking skills that A1 exams test, it's clear that you are expected to just construct an intelligible sentence where the word order is not weird.

[scenic obsidian]

If they're only just now learning to put the second verb at the end of the sentence

[remote bridge]

It’s just a bunch of activities of the same topic. Verbs we have learned:
spielen, kommen, müssen, kaufen, können, heißen, and activity verbs such as lesen, tanzen, und joggen (there’s more for activity verbs)

[scenic obsidian]

@remote bridge do you know about nominative case versus accusative case?

[plush locust]

since September?

[scenic obsidian]

ich vs mich

der Hund vs den Hund

[remote bridge]

there’s probably more I didn’t list, that’s just from memory

[plush locust]

I'd never list "müssen" in a verb list, because its a modal verb, which made me have this (!) rise up over my head

[scenic obsidian]

modal verbs are verbs, though?

[remote bridge]

Ich is for “i” and mich is for some cases, although I don’t know. Only example I got is “für dich”

[remote bridge]

Never went over der vs den.

I have to tell my teacher, something seems wrong.

[scenic obsidian]

Yeah, this course sounds super slow

[plush locust]

well, yes...come on, you know what I mean >.<

[scenic obsidian]

Idk if it's a straight up waste of time, but you can definitely learn faster on your own. Check the YouTube channel I linked

And also check out resources in the pinned Google Doc in #resources

[frigid tinsel]

What you want is likely AP German

[plush locust]

dative case is the one that students start realizing that German is a pain, usually (because suddenly there's also 20 prepositions and most - but not all - demand it)

[remote bridge]

That’s German 4 in this school.

[frigid tinsel]

Which treats learning German as a college level subject, in High School.

Yeah, I know.

[remote bridge]

German 1, 2, 3 (honors), 4 (AP)

[scenic obsidian]

You can't skip to AP stuff

[remote bridge]

Well obviously

[scenic obsidian]

You do still need to learn the material

But you could probably do it quickly on your own, if you dedicated enough time for it, and then maybe test into AP German

[frigid tinsel]

Yeah, don't skip. But aim for AP and prepare yourself appropriately if you wanna be serious. Or wait till college.

[remote bridge]

I wasn’t going to skip at all what

[plush locust]

btw, do you guys use textbooks or self-made materials by the school/teacher? From what I've seen so far, the latter seems to be not that uncommon '_'

[indigo bear]

As a small note, dative is often taught separately from prepositions since it's more sensible to split it up.

[remote bridge]

That’s the stupid part. We should have, but we didn’t. The course plan shows different things than what we’re doing, and says it’s supplied with a textbook. I don’t know man it’s either the school’s problem or it’s just heavily outdated

[plush locust]

dative without prepositions is, yes

[indigo bear]

Well you did say just "dative case" which I take to mean "dative without prepositions".

[frigid tinsel]

Honestly? If your high school has an AP German program, then it's a better high school for German than most American schools.

[remote bridge]

It just feels like we don’t care about grammar and it’s just in matter of just remembering how something is written and trying to work with it

Causing us to not understand why, but still use it

[frigid tinsel]

The good news is you can study grammar by yourself.

I'm in a very different boat than you. I'm an adult with a full time job studying German for fun. I do have a class / private tutor. But even in this course, a lot of grammar is avoided.

So I just take it on myself to learn grammar. It's obviously important so I'll study it.

An actual school with a German program still means you have a German teacher who you speak to regularly. An AP program means someone at the school is certified to teach college level German.

I did basically that for a few AP subjects I was interested in. A few counseling sessions later, I was the first 10th grader taking AP Comp Sci at my high school.

If you are serious about learning something, the teachers and school system can feel it and they can work with you to reach higher heights.

[plush locust]

What you say reminds me of a boy I taught in December who attended a British school here, and they had all self-made material. It was a lot of "flowcharts" (e.g., you make a proper sentence for the topic by combining these things). All resulted in proper German, but when I asked him if he understands why this stuff is the way it is, he was just "no idea".

[remote bridge]

We get a vocab list, we get verbs, sentences, and nouns, then we use them.

That’s the unit.

Just memorize it and then go on to the next one!

[plush locust]

sentences means premade patterns, as what I envision, perhaps?

e.g., "Meine Stadt hat eine Kirche." - maybe it has a Rathaus, too, so "Meine Stadt hat ein Rathaus.", to be very simple.

[remote bridge]

Basically “Person verb things after”

With the occasional ones that don’t with set sentence starters

[plush locust]

Likely temporal words (gestern, Am Montag, etc.)

[remote bridge]

for dates, times, and events, yes. We didn’t talk about words like gestern much, but we did at the beginning of the class

[frigid tinsel]

AP German is B1 equivalent?

Yo man, you'll be pretty good if you get up there!

[plush locust]

I mean, for gestern you do need Perfekt (did you have it? D: )

[frigid tinsel]

How many people in your school takes the AP German class, and how many pass?

[remote bridge]

Never used it in an ACTUAL sentence, nor have we really talked about where times, dates, and events can be. Only have learned in the beginning with commas of course

[remote bridge]

I don’t know

I think commonly?

[plush locust]

I mean: Heute esse ich Pizza. - Gestern habe ich Pizza gegessen.

[remote bridge]

I mean, verbs are second, so I guess so

Heute yes we are actually using quite often right now

[frigid tinsel]

I mean, maybe your school is structured A1 (year 1). A2.1 (year 2), A2.3 (year 3). AP German (B1 equivalent).

It's a bit slow but it's reasonable.

[remote bridge]

By German 3, you should be applicable of being bilingual.

Meaning before or after, you should be able to pass.

[plush locust]

Should I exchange dative case from now on with Dativ to make it clearer? [likewise I, a moment earlier, had replaced perfect tense with Perfekt]

[remote bridge]

That’s what they say.

[plush locust]

yeah, but gestern?

[plush locust]

what on earth is A2.3?

[remote bridge]

Oh wait. Do you mean with the difference with the verb or the sentence structure?

[frigid tinsel]

Lol. My tutor is A2.1, A2.2, A2.3, then B1.1

[remote bridge]

I have never seen a “gegessen” so

[frigid tinsel]

I dunno how everyone else does it.

[indigo bear]

No? The language you use for the name doesn't matter. But dative case (or Dativ) by itself doesn't inherently include prepositions.

Dative is a case. So by itself it just includes declension.

[remote bridge]

Seems like it’s just adding geg to the beginning.

[plush locust]

you'd have at the latest 50% into A1

[frigid tinsel]

Well, that plus hat/ist

[remote bridge]

So instead of eating pizza yesterday you basically had it and ate it. That’s what I’m looking at.

I’m guessing that’s how it’s structured

[frigid tinsel]

"habe gegessen" is roughly equivalent to "ate"

I ate Pizza yesterday.

[remote bridge]

interessant

[frigid tinsel]

Ich habe gestern Pizza gegessen.

[remote bridge]

I had eaten pizza yesterday.

[plush locust]

a perfect form typically (mind you, we got our exceptions, because German :3 ) adds a ge- in front of the verb, and replaces the -en at the end either with -t or just keeps it

[remote bridge]

Or basically in non dumb form:
I ate pizza yesterday

[plush locust]

and which one you do depends on whether the verb is regular or irregular

e.g., lernen -> ge-lern-t; essen -> ge-[g]ess-en; kaufen -> ge-kauf-t; fahren -> ge-fahr-en

[remote bridge]

oh, uh

[gentle venture]

it's literally "I have eaten pizza yesterday"

i had would be ich hatte

[remote bridge]

meh I was close

[plush locust]

again something you didn't learn yet?

[gentle venture]

sure, it's just important to keep it all straight

[remote bridge]

is this something close to vowels with “gegessen”?

[frigid tinsel]

You know see, saw, seen? Now do it in German.

Irregulars just mess up the rules entirely.

[plush locust]

(its fine, because in the end, in German, you actually have to memorize regular/irregular for all verbs)

[remote bridge]

t, and en difference. Or verb regularity

[remote bridge]

wow

[plush locust]

when you learn German verbs, you ultimately have to learn the infinitive, the 3rd person present tense, the past participle, (and the past tense, but only if you want to write novels and not read them)

[remote bridge]

To avoid confusion, another g is added?

[gentle venture]

it's just irregular

[plush locust]

I like saying to make it pronouncable without being annoying, but there may be a deeper historical reason here

[remote bridge]

yeah that’s irregular

[plush locust]

essen -> er isst [irregular: ess->iss] -> therefore, ge[g]essen

but kaufen -> er kauft [regular[ -> therefore, gekauft

this is something you want to get down soon, but also this rule is thrown a curveball anyway, so you just have to rote memorize verbs in these forms to make the rest

[frigid tinsel]

In the great scheme of things, the number of irregular verbs is pretty small: around 200

[remote bridge]

Essen has always confused me because of isst. it’s like how sein confused me with “ist, bist,” and others.

[plush locust]

there's about 180 verb patterns

[remote bridge]

They’re common though I’m guessing?

[frigid tinsel]

Yeah, they are common. And recycled, which is where Mori is likely going.

[plush locust]

yeah but sein is the first thing you usually get down because its just so pattern-less 😄

[frigid tinsel]

ziehen, zieht, zog, hat gezogen, means to pull, he pulls, he pulled, he had pulled (roughly).

[plush locust]

I'm not sure if it makes sense to try and explain past participle formation right here lol (I fear not)

[frigid tinsel]

Actually good point let's no go there.

[plush locust]

ziehen zieht

the insight you usually get from being shown this anyway is that "...ah great I have to memorize even more shit"

[remote bridge]

It gets a little confusing when you use it possessively.

[frigid tinsel]

anziehen means to dress.

And the rules start to interact, because now you have to deal with the "an".

But the overall pattern is following ziehen, zieht, zog ...

But yeah, that's much later.

[indigo bear]

For past tense it's best to specify "simple past" since both simple past and present perfect are "past tense".

[indigo bear]

Recycled?

[gentle venture]

please also specify the past tense of the language you're talking about, there's a past tense in english, french, etc.

[indigo bear]

No, it's clear the context is German language.

[plush locust]

when you learn German verbs specifies

(in a German language learning discord)

[gentle venture]

well it was clear, since he mentioned the past participle seperately that he was talking about the simple past

i thought we were asking him to be specific so that we didn't have to actually pay attention to the context?

[indigo bear]

It's clear to someone who already knows the tenses. Not necessarily a beginner who is unfamiliar with grammar terminology.

[gentle venture]

ah i see, because someone might look up the past participle see that they also have to learn the past tense and conclude that they already did so

a beginner might never conclude that the past tense refers to the simple past

[indigo bear]

Exactly.

[remote bridge]

And I think I’m being overloaded with info too

[gentle venture]

they would see that there's two past tenses, see that one had already been referred to, see that the second was called the simple past, and be confused

[indigo bear]

Plus it's just helpful to Morri so he can use that in future explanations.

[indigo bear]

Yeah, exactly, especially considering there are other names used for simple past so they could even think there are more than 2 past tenses.

So using specific terms is just a best practice in these situations.

[indigo bear]

Yes, sorry about that. Sometimes people here get a bit overeager to help and jump into too many topics. Feel free to ignore most of the discussion since it's not anything you need to memorise right now.

[remote bridge]

I think I’ll go watch some of the grammar videos Argus (yes) sent me

[indigo bear]

Sounds good. And take it one topic at a time since rushing it or jumping ahead can lead to some confusion.

And feel free to ask here if you get stuck.

[indigo bear]

Oh btw here are some free exercise sheets, in case you want to practice topics as you go: https://www.nthuleen.com/teach/grammar.html

[remote bridge]

Already seems like “einen” makes more sense for accusative. It’s not that big of a difference either, only masculine.

[indigo bear]

Yes, exactly.

Nominative and accusative are exactly the same, except for masculine singular.

[plush locust]

yeah, accusative is the easy step

[plush locust]

Thank you. I'm not teaching in English usually (and not thinking in English grammar terminology), I operate in German [...and Japanese elsewhere]. As far as English tenses go, I do need to learn those more actively, though. (I also wonder to what extent English Present Perfect and German Perfekt overlap.)

[frigid tinsel]

Yeah, treat this all as previews for where your class will eventually go.

[indigo bear]

Yeah, it's not a big deal, I feel like I see that translation mistake pretty often from native German speakers. Translating Präteritum as just "past tense", I mean. The English technical term is preterite, but more commonly "simple past".

[indigo bear]

I would recommend to hold back on giving "previews" so much because I notice you do it often with beginners and it's usually confusing/overwhelming for them.

It's fine to do it with intermediate/advanced learners who are comfortable with discussing grammar though.

[remote bridge]

NO

nevermind sorry lol

[frigid tinsel]

No.....

[remote bridge]

Direct… things..

[frigid tinsel]

I gave him the ball.

[remote bridge]

😭

[remote bridge]

Yes that’s accusative.

[indigo bear]

You're just mixing up two different topics:

1. definite and indefinite articles
2. nominative and accusative

[frigid tinsel]

What is accuative (or in English: Direct Object?) Which word?

[indigo bear]

der/die/das = definite articles
ein/eine = indefinite articles

[remote bridge]

The ball specifically,

[frigid tinsel]

I gave him a ball.

[remote bridge]

I dunno what I made up there. I really meant indefinite.

[remote bridge]

indefinite accusative

[indigo bear]

Small correction: accusative is not "direct object" in English. They're separate grammar concepts.

[frigid tinsel]

Yeah, "accusative" doesn't translate perfectly into "direct object".

[remote bridge]

I’d say it’s the main clause or something

[frigid tinsel]

hmmmmmmm......

Well, I said I'd stop overwhelming you.

Lets just say it gets complicated.

[indigo bear]

Accusative doesn't really exist in English. That's the main difference. English has direct and indirect objects, while German has nominative, accusative, dative and genitive. There's some similarities but they're different systems.

For verbs with 2 objects, like geben, they line up. Accusative = direct object, dative = indirect object. But in other situations (like with prepositions) they don't align at all.

[remote bridge]

Ok. Dative goes before accusative in sentences with nominative, accusative, and dative nouns.

[indigo bear]

If the accusative object is a noun, then yeah, the dative will go before it.

But an accusative pronoun goes before the dative object.

[remote bridge]

Dative verbs are more confusing.

[frigid tinsel]

Careful. German sentence construction is very different than English.

[remote bridge]

Probably the hardest part.

[indigo bear]

If you mean verbs with just one object and the object is dative, it might seem confusing at first, but it's simply a memorisation thing. There's only a few verbs like that, so you just memorise which ones.

[plush locust]

For you guys having said to not make it too complicated, you surely are making it lol

[frigid tinsel]

"I gave him the ball". "I watched him the Television".

[remote bridge]

what.

[indigo bear]

Everything I've explained has been very simple and clear and directly answering the questions asked without going on tangents.

[remote bridge]

you what

[frigid tinsel]

You'll know when the indirect object doesn't work.

Indirect object doesn't work with that verb.

German verbs will be different, but the overall idea is the same. There's an "understanding" of which verbs take which kinds of objects.

[remote bridge]

ihn?

I’m guessing that’s one can that work as indirect.

and that’s the entire point of learning it

in fact we may have had an entire day of accusative terms, but we just never use them to help memorize and that’s just… stupid

[frigid tinsel]

As you learn German verbs, remember which ones take dative, which ones take accusative, and which ones take both.

(and... other cases as you learn more grammar....)

[indigo bear]

Yeah, it is definitely important to practice what you learn.

That's how it sticks in your memory.

[remote bridge]

ah, so we have used dative before, just never did we go over it because I’ve never known what it is

mir, dir, uns, euch, etc.

[plush locust]

Usually the very first lesson you get in German you already use accusative, you just don't notice, because its first being learned with words that don't need an article (e.g., "Ich mag Musik")

[plush locust]

Wie geht es dir? :3

(its also very much intended to not use words with articles, mind you...)

[remote bridge]

You know, I’ve actually never known what geht is. It’s just gehen.

[plush locust]

gehen has...many meanings.

[remote bridge]

usually, go.

[plush locust]

the obvious one is to walk, to go, to move (distancing from a point of origin)

to continue, to move on

from this moving-on the "Wie geht es" is derived.

how does it go?

ah, badly.

The dative just refers to that how does it go for you

[remote bridge]

Looking at it, does not make sense. The “does”

[plush locust]

how goes it?

[remote bridge]

makes more sense

[plush locust]

Roll with that.

[indigo bear]

Yeah, that is a strange thing that just English does. We add an extra "do" helper verb sometimes, that other languages like German don't bother with.

[remote bridge]

I guess so.
We’ve always said “Wie geht’s” is “how are you?” but it seems more like “how are you going?” with extra context to the verb now

Ever since the start.

[indigo bear]

Yeah. Translations are not perfect between languages, simply because people in different languages think differently.

Just like how someone from the UK vs the US will say things differently because of their dialect.

When you translate, you translate the meaning rather than the exact words.

[sleek pebble]

but it literally means "how is it going?", which is said in english

[remote bridge]

yep

[frigid tinsel]

This keeps happening in my German study. I see something, I think its stupid and then I realize English has it too.

[sleek pebble]

:DDD

i feel a lot like that with other languages too. i don't think it's stupid, but at first it sounds super alien to me, then i translate it in my head and it's verbatim 1:1 the same thing, but it still feels different to me until i get used to it

[ancient glen]

Why does trying to learn a language feel like 5d chess /j

[frigid tinsel]

The most recent example of this was auflegen. Up lay? On lay? Why is putting something down with "auf" ??

Then I realized: "Hang Up"

We do it in English.

[plush locust]

or...imagine (if you know what a vinyl is): Ich lege eine Platte auf.

[sleek pebble]

ye, both describe the literal action you take with old telephones

[remote bridge]

replacing the ‘s in “geht’s” just makes it geht es.

[plush locust]

lay on

[remote bridge]

from what it seems.

[sleek pebble]

while the english one seems to rather have a wall mounted telephone in mind

[plush locust]

auflegen is to lay on something

[sleek pebble]

yeah, the receiver

you lay it onto the telephone

[plush locust]

or the vinyl record player

[sleek pebble]

aswell as you may hang the receiver onto the telephone if it's wall mounted

[indigo bear]

Feel free to ask here if you need help with something.

[plush locust]

yeah, I remember those phones. Aufhängen was, at a time, not a wrong word, to be honest. (But nowadays, everyone would assume that you just executed someone by hanging.) ...was it, actually 🤔

[sleek pebble]

seems plausible

[plush locust]

it was.

[indigo bear]

Auf is often used to describe putting things down, since the main translation of auf is "on", as in, on top of a horizontal surface. Many things are placed "down" onto a horizontal surface, so "auf" is naturally common there.

[sleek pebble]

but i haven't heard it before myself because i'm too young to have been around where wall mounted home telephones were a thing

[indigo bear]

Yes, that's right. Geht's or gehts is a contraction of geht es.

[sleek pebble]

i feel like in germany anyway they were more commonly placed on a little table

in the past 40-50 years

[plush locust]

phones?

[sleek pebble]

yeah

landline telephones

[plush locust]

Absolutely.

Usually close to the entrance or so.

[sleek pebble]

yeah so you don't have to install a cable through walls across the whole house

since back then landline was still above the ground

telephone lines that is

[remote bridge]

Because it is

[indigo bear]

That's interesting.

Here we had wall mounted phones until landline phones stopped being used.

[plush locust]

Mir sind wandmontierte Telefone aber auch fremd...

[sleek pebble]

yeah i would assume the average german would pick the cheapest and most efficient option, which is just a little wooden stand near the entrance to save money on getting a cable installed in your house so you can have a wall mounted telephone

it sounds stereotypical but i honestly cannot think of a person whom i could convince to have this kind of handiwork done when it can also be done otherwise

besides, why would you want it on the wall? it'd be nicer to be able to sit down while on a call, ideally at the table where pen and paper are available to jot something down

at least that's what i would do

[indigo bear]

That is probably related to the age of the buildings too though, right? If it's a new home, it's not that big of an investment in comparison to adding it to an old home.

[sleek pebble]

oh yeah most likely

[plush locust]

We had two phones, house built in 1989 or 1990 (I'm too old to remember this exactly): one in the office of my dad in the roof, another near the entrance. We also had a cassette-recorder answering machine which I just have to mention because its so old tech.

[indigo bear]

That makes sense for older phones but later they were wireless so you can walk around with the phone. In which case picking it up while standing was more practical.

[sleek pebble]

though even then, in my village, recently, they gave people the option to upgrade from DSL to fiber optic, and from what i've seen, they drilled holes into one of the walls facing the street and likely didn't go much further...

in all likelihood that's probably how they did it with telephones too :DDD

[plush locust]

in Germany? 😮

[sleek pebble]

yes ...

[plush locust]

Ich habe seit 5 Jahren einen laufenden Auftrag für Glasfaser, ey 😄 (d.h., ich warte, dass etwas passiert)

[sleek pebble]

to be fair though, the company didn't seem legit to me at all, which is why i stuck with DSL, got a free upgrade to 250mbps and use DSL almost all alone in this village, which is why it works really well for me :DDD

[plush locust]

to be fair, unless you start doing stuff like 8k video streaming, DSL is sufficient. Except for uploading.

[sleek pebble]

stable 250mbps DSL is nothing i would ever complain about

sure, glass fiber would be nicer, but the company did a botch job in many homes and i kind of anticipated it the first time they were at my doorstep

i don't regret anything, this is great, cuz now i got this line almost for myself and they're not getting rid of it anytime soon :DDD

[plush locust]

[I think we moved far away from German grammar and language now. Ist deutsche Kultur und Gesellschaft hier erlaubt? 😄 ]

[sleek pebble]

and if they ever do get rid of it, they will offer me a fiber upgrade anyway

so why be bothered =)

[remote bridge]

Ok, Nominative is the common noun, usually in sentences with one objects (such as one person or one thing), Accusative is usually used in sentences with 2 objects, such as a person and a thing, and use things like mich, dich, ihn, sie (why is this unchanged why why), and Sie, and Dative is usually with 3 objects or in verbs.
Only thing I don’t mainly understand is why you can use Dative pronouns (or whatever they’re called) outside of Dative (cases?). Or what is even called Dative (no wonder this is the hardest case).

[sleek pebble]

you're thinking about it the wrong way

it's not bound to quantity but to function within the sentence

nominative, while being the dictionary form, usually is the subject

[remote bridge]

such as he, I, she

or just a thing

[plush locust]

"Only thing I don’t mainly understand is why you can use Dative pronouns (or whatever they’re called) outside of Dative (cases?). Or what is even called Dative (no wonder this is the hardest case)" - can you give an example here?

[sleek pebble]

accusative usually gets taken by the direct object, the object of a transitive verb for example, i.e. the direct receiver of an action

[remote bridge]

Here? Why would dir work here and not du?

[sleek pebble]

yeah, but it can be anything, it's just the executing party of an action within the sentence

[plush locust]

because its a verb that requires a dative object [note: this gehen is not the to walk gehen]

[remote bridge]

hm ok

[plush locust]

Also, the subject is "es".

[sleek pebble]

"I like him" - here, "I" would be nominative in german because it's who does the action in this active sentence. "him" is the accusative object, similarly, you wouldn't say "I like he" in english - it must be "him" - that being the direct object, i.e. the accusative object

[plush locust]

You usually learn these words with what, I suppose, zuzu will now say

[remote bridge]

I is nominative, him is accusative

already knew that correctly

[plush locust]

or not

[sleek pebble]

can also correspond to dative

[plush locust]

There is a set (its not giant) of verbs that uses dative as object. A typical example is "I help you" which is in German "Ich helfe dir" - not "dich".

[frigid tinsel]

Do we complicate things by bringing up Genativ now or.... ?

Lol

[plush locust]

DONT

[gentle venture]

ich bedarf des Genitivs

[remote bridge]

In the video on datives, I saw “hilfen” which seems like dative version of helfen.

[plush locust]

it will be helfen, if it said "hilfen" its a typo

[sleek pebble]

dative handles the indirect object. picture this:
"I give the ball to him."
here, "I" is nominative, it describes who carries out the action, "the ball" is accusative, not dative, because "the ball" is actually the receiver of the action "to give," which leaves "to him," where "him" would be dative in german, because it is not the direct object of the action "to give," but rather a secondary one

you'd best look it up online

it'll give you a better explanation than that

[frigid tinsel]

On this subject: @remote bridge How often are you looking up words in a dictionary?

[indigo bear]

To be clear: this rule is ONLY for verbs with 2 objects. Not verbs with 1 object or prepositions.

[sleek pebble]

of course

[remote bridge]

Not much right now cuz it’s mostly pronouns which most of them I know, however I still like to look at the case chart for pronouns and search the occasion word.

[sleek pebble]

thanks

[sleek pebble]

i was just trying to find an example that features both types of objects to illustrate the idea behind both direct and indirect objects

[frigid tinsel]

Its fine, just when you start looking things up, these words will be there.

[sleek pebble]

but i feel like a real grammarian's explanation will be more suitable

[frigid tinsel]

And it will make you more comfortable as you get more lookup practice.

[indigo bear]

This is fine but the direct/indirect object thing only applies to verbs with 2 objects. Accusative/dative and direct/indirect are different systems that don't really align except for verbs with 2 objects. So it's important to be clear on that when giving those examples.

[gentle venture]

i mean the dative covers several unrelated things

you just have to start somwhere and identify them later

[sleek pebble]

mmmyeah but even with verbs that take only one object, be it direct or indirect, the idea behind them stays the same. it describes the logic of the action grammatically, and for starters one should get accustomed to that concept

[indigo bear]

Yes, both accusative and dative covers a lot more things than direct/indirect objects in English do. And English direct objects can be dative in German.

[frigid tinsel]

Historically its because Latin had... what? 7 cases or something? And then all the languages simplified them down over time, merging the different cases together every few centuries.

[sleek pebble]

but yes, it is more complex than i made it out to be

[gentle venture]

i mean German doesn't come from Latin, but our terminology does

objects of prepositions in Latin were mostly covered by the ablative and the accusative

[plush locust]

6

[gentle venture]

dative comes from the word to give, hence its usage as an indirect object

that's why it's called the dative in German

because it also covers that function

[indigo bear]

Yes, it is good to start simple. I often start beginners with "the subject is nominative and the object is accusative", along with "but this is a simplified version and it gets more complicated later" or similar. But the issue is that when people equate "indirect object" with "dative", or "direct object" with "accusative", it causes a lot more confusion than it solves. So it's important that if you want to use that comparison, always specify "for verbs with 2 objects like geben" or something similar.

[gentle venture]

it doesn't cause confusion, if you just say that helfen takes an indirect object

[indigo bear]

You don't have to explain everything from the start. But just indicate to the learner the scope of where this current rule you're explaining can be applied.

[indigo bear]

It absolutely does and has many times here in the past. Because in English it takes a direct object.

[sleek pebble]

yeah ok that seems plausible. sometimes it's difficult to judge how much a foreigner whose language does not feature any of this is going ot understand of this from the getgo eheh

[gentle venture]

yes, well they're going to have to learn its different from english one way or another

[remote bridge]

I think I’m going to go. Mostly because I need sleep, but also because you’re over complicating it when I mostly got it.

[plush locust]

no point to 🤔 this, @frigid tinsel , this is literally the history of linguistics. We slammed Latin terminology on everything in all our languages for historical reasons.

[indigo bear]

Yeah, exactly. In which case it's better to completely skip the unnecessary direct/indirect explanation and just say "helfen requires a dative object", to avoid all the confusion.

[gentle venture]

well you should say that too

but if you explained the dative as being the indirect object

[frigid tinsel]

I'm not being sarcastic. You are making me truly think.

Sorry if you're taking it with a hint of sarcasm.

[indigo bear]

Yeah, agreed. I'm sorry for the overcomplicated explanations being provided by others. Maybe come back later when there are less people active here or when the users who are better at explaining to beginners are active.

[plush locust]

I'm also being not ironic/sarcastic 🙂

[indigo bear]

That's a completely unnecessary and unhelpful step because it means nothing and helps people in no way whatsoever.

[gentle venture]

im so sorry, please come back when there's less people

[indigo bear]

"To help" has a direct object. Helfen has a dative direct object. What benefit does a learner get from "helfen has an indirect object"? How would they use that information? Especially since it's incorrect.

[gentle venture]

people don't know what dative is. they do know what direct and indirect objects are in english. you say it's like the indirect object. Helfen just happens to take indirect object/dative

what's there to be confused about

[indigo bear]

But helfen does not take an indirect object. It takes a direct object and the direct object is dative.

[plush locust]

"it just takes dative" would be better

[indigo bear]

Yeah, exactly as Morri says. Just say "helfen takes dative". No need to add unnecessary (and false) info.

[plush locust]

(and dative just means this declension pattern of dem der dem den, mir dir etcpp.)

[gentle venture]

🤦‍♂️

have you guys ever actually worked with someone learning a language

and i mean not just spilling your grammatical guts at some noob on the internet

[indigo bear]

Yes I have. Which is why I've learned that this direct/indirect shortcut is more confusing than helpful. (It is helpful for verbs with 2 objects though.)

[plush locust]

you mean teaching it to people who actually don't know what a dative is? yes

[gentle venture]

don't lie to me

the question was rhetorical

[plush locust]

(they also don't know what a "direct object" is)

[gentle venture]

🤦‍♂️

[plush locust]

目的語ならわかるけど

[indigo bear]

Okay, drop the topic now. This is not a place for fighting. We're trying to help you learn about the grammar and how to better explain the topic to beginners. If you're not actually interested in that, please just leave the discussion.

[old delta]

Ich weiß nicht, was das bedeutet.

Is this a correct way to say "I don't know what that means"?

bedeutet seems to be the 2nd person plural conjugation, I'm assuming it's 2nd person because it's referring to "was" but why is it plural? Or am I mistaken for which conjugation it is

[indigo bear]

Yes, it's correct. No, bedeutet here is not plural. It is 3rd person singular.

For example: Das bedeutet ...

[old delta]

Which tense? That doesn't seem to line up with what I see on verbformen

[indigo bear]

Can you show a screenshot or link of what you're looking at?

[old delta]

https://www.verbformen.com/?w=bedeutet

[old delta]

Oh yeah nvm I had a brain fart, my bad

Is it always 3rd person if it's an object?

[indigo bear]

And if it helps, these ones at the top are always 3rd person singular.

[indigo bear]

By object you mean a noun, right?

Yes, nouns are always 3rd person.

[old delta]

Ahk yep, ty

[indigo bear]

I would say only ich/wir and du/ihr/Sie can be 1st or 2nd person.

And every other kind of subject is 3rd person.

Unless there's something I'm forgetting.

[old delta]

In the 2nd clause of the sentence does bedautet have to be at the end or can it be before das?

[plush locust]

Think of "Was bedeutet das?"

[old delta]

In fact shouldn't it be before das so it can be 2nd position?

[indigo bear]

In this sentence, the 2nd clause is a relative clause. Relative clauses are when you start the clause with a word that refers back to something in the previous clause. And relative clauses are always subordinate clauses (the finite verb goes at the end instead of 2nd position).

[old delta]

Hmm should I wait till I'm above A1 before I try sentences with more than 1 clause? Or are they not that difficult

[indigo bear]

Actually if it's easier, you can also think of this kind of clause as an "indirect question".

[indigo bear]

It's okay to have more than one clause. But relative clauses are one step past that. Usually you start with 2 clauses where they're joined by conjunctions.

Conjunctions being words like and, or, because, etc.

So for example: Ich esse Brot und ich trinke Milch. Two clauses but very beginner friendly.

[old delta]

Clauses explicitly joined by a conjunction don't need a comma right?

[indigo bear]

It depends on the conjunction.

With "und" and "oder" the comma is not needed. But other conjunctions, the comma is needed.

For example: Ich esse Brot, weil ich Hunger habe.

[old delta]

Ahk makes sense

And all question words need the comma as well I assume?

[plush locust]

you could have gone for a main clause one (e.g., denn, which is A1)

[plush locust]

yes

[indigo bear]

Yes, when you're talking about an indirect question, like your earlier example, it needs a comma and it's a subordinate clause (verb at end).

[indigo bear]

Usually coordinating and subordinating conjunctions are learned one after the other anyway.

So the A1/A2 distinction is not as important there.

[old delta]

What's the difference between weil and denn? According to dict.cc they seem to be pretty much the same

[plush locust]

The connectivity and usage. E.g.

Denn connects two Hauptsätze: Ich habe Hunger. Denn Ich habe noch nichts gegessen.

[indigo bear]

Mainly just word order rules.

[plush locust]

Weil is a conjunction that introduces a subordinate clause (Nebensatz)

[indigo bear]

You can treat them as synonyms as far as the meaning.

And people also use "da" the same as "weil", so you may also see that.

[plush locust]

Denn always explains the sentence that came before, weil can go before or after in that regard. But weil also can no longer be used in written prose (e.g., journalism, academia) - that is where da is used.

If you are learning A1 for an exam in mind @old delta , don't worry about this too much, because only "denn" matters.

[old delta]

Should I be using denn instead of weil in all/most situations?

[winter kayak]

No weil is far and away the most common

[plush locust]

Yes, you should use weil, if you can to

its basically the ultimate weapon to give reasons

[winter kayak]

Also am not sure about weil not being used in written prose…will have to keep my eyes peeled, but I feel like it’s used in journalism as well as “da” and “denn”

[plush locust]

but if you are learning for A1 you can ignore this stuff and pass the exam and then go for it

[plush locust]

0% in academia

Hegel would still have used it lol

[winter kayak]

Yeah first article I clicked lol

[plush locust]

Still would not use it in an academic paper.

Its an objectivity thing, I think.

[winter kayak]

Most academic papers are published in English anyway. But I’d be curious about finding examples there, too. Let me take a look

[plush locust]

As in, you'd never pair "weil" with a passive voice.

[plush locust]

Also thanks because I have to modify my stance. Its a voice issue, not a style issue (...which is also a voice issue).

[winter kayak]

Yeah also first article I downloaded

[plush locust]

Dann sind wir wohl immer noch bei einer Stimmen- oder Stilfrage lol

(wer btw zitiert hier Butler?)

(Hach meine Studierenden starben so an Butler)

[winter kayak]

Natascha Gruver 😂 it’s the only field I’ve read (modern) academic literature in German.

[plush locust]

Gender theory or studies or...?_?

[winter kayak]

Jaaa ig that would be the name

[plush locust]

Ich habe vor Jahren mal Gender History an der Uni gegeben. (Während Covid =_=)

[winter kayak]

Hey echt cool! Du bist also Dozent?

[plush locust]

Gewesen.

Als ob man in Deutschland an der Uni arbeiten kann lol

[winter kayak]

Hahaha schade T_T

[plush locust]

Ja T_T

[plush locust]

Also, interessant finde ich das schon: Denn, ich würde hier einfach "da" setzen...aber das ist auch ein Objektivitätsproblem. ("da" ist objektiver, da [sic!] es neutraler ist. Ich bin Historiker. Ich muss mein Selbst auslöschen - oder es zumindest versuchen.)

Ergibt Sinn. Laut dwds wäre weil emphatischer. Aber in der Wissenschaft gibt es nur sehr gezielt Emphasen.

(zumindest in meiner :/ )

An der Textstelle passt das. weil ist implizit eigtl. immer gerade weil (in Schriftsprache).

Wieder was gelernt.

[frigid tinsel]

Can someone grade my answers?

[plush locust]

If you provide the questions.

[plush locust]

What book is that?

[frigid tinsel]

Grammatik aktiv

It seems free-form, so I don't really know how to self-grade here....

[plush locust]

Cornelsen?

[frigid tinsel]

yeah

I'm typing it up for easier reading now....

2. Wir brauchen Getränke -> Soll ich bezahlen helfen?

3. Es ist kalt hier. -> Sollen wir in das Haus gehen?

4. Ich habe Hunger. -> Sollen wir im Restaurant gehen?

5. Ich lerne nicht gerne alleine. -> Sollen wir zusammen lernen?

---

2. Ich habe Kopfschmerzen -> Soll ich dir Tee machen?

3. Ich verstehe die Grammatik nicht -> Soll ich dir Grammatik lehren?

[plush locust]

5.2. Soll ich sie kaufen? - Soll ich sie tragen helfen? are better.

5.3 in das = ins. (but we have a word for this called reingehen). They likely wanted something like "Soll ich die Heizung anmachen?"

5.4 "Sollen wir ins Restaurant gehen" is grammatically correct (again, case mistake); but semantically, you'd say "Sollen wir in ein Restaurant gehen?" (eins, nicht das Restaurant); they'd probably intended "Soll ich etwas kochen?" or so.

5.5 perfect 😄

[frigid tinsel]

At least I got one of them!

[plush locust]

6.2 fine, but "einen Tee" would be more common (for now, I make you one tea, then a buttload of); 6.3 is not how you use lehren

based on the idea of the book, which is that you are not a professional teacher, so you do not "lehren", you can "erklären"

[indigo bear]

Is passive preferred in academic papers in German?

[frigid tinsel]

Thanks for the tips.

[plush locust]

History struggles. Also see above, I had to rectify to it being a matter of emphasis.

[indigo bear]

I'm just curious because I'm usually recommended to use active voice in stuff like that in English.

[plush locust]

Zu 6.3.: you can also use "beibringen" [ich bringe dir bei] as a verb to mean to teach s.o. sth

[plush locust]

English has a very different academic culture in history... x.X

I do prefer it, tbh. I also try to introduce strategic usages of "Ich", for example.

[indigo bear]

Yeah.

I find it weird to use "I" when writing up research but "we" is also kinda weird if you worked on it alone.

[plush locust]

Whenever I read not-history, I am amazed how open they are with sentences like "Ich gehe davon aus..." or so.

[indigo bear]

Yes... My preference leans towards people writing how they feel the ideas are best expressed. But that's a bit of a different and more complicated topic I guess.

[plush locust]

It vastly is, and shaped by the respective (academic) culture, disciplinary practice, etc.

[indigo bear]

It's good nonetheless to know what the standards are so you can break them strategically.

[plush locust]

I'm already an outlier because I do write a historical biography (...I regret it, its a different issue though) and that just doesn't work like a thematic text focused on some kind of phenomenon or concept. (It also requires more of a narrative voice.)

[indigo bear]

True... A big factor to me is the exclusionary nature of established writing styles in areas where the focus should be on sharing knowledge rather than what exact voice someone uses.

e.g. people from different cultures being excluded because the ideas they want to express can't be expressed properly in that writing style.

Maybe I will try reading some German papers in my areas of work and see how it is.

[plush locust]

what field would that be?

I've always been (trying to) give a s***, but always also realize how something pushes me to conform. It's annoying.

[indigo bear]

Environment. Like fire, weather, vegetation, biodiversity, etc.

[plush locust]

Methodologically STEM-y? (If, then does anyone even write in German...)

[kindred forge]

Ohhh danke

[cobalt aurora]

People who are B2 and above. What type of German media do you consume from where you get most of your vocabulary?

News? Vlogs? History/ economic. What's that useful one genre

[fallow lava]

does this make sense
"Die DDR-Führer hatten Angst vor Menschen die DDR auszuziehen."

[indigo bear]

Ja.

[indigo bear]

Novels.

[astral yoke]

Die DDR-Machthaber hatten Angst, dass Menschen aus der DDR fliehen wollten.
(Führer is quite a biased word)

[cobalt aurora]

German ones or english Translated ones?

[plush locust]

German obviously

[indigo bear]

For vocab, either works. It has more to do with the specific author/translator than the original language.

Some authors prefer simple language and some prefer to use languages creatively.

[hollow umbra]

Ausziehen is take off clothes...

And leave an apartment

[cobalt aurora]

Alright man thanks, I'll look into some good ones then

[fallow lava]

I thought that was sich ausziehen?

[hollow umbra]

"Meine Hose ausziehen" as well

[fallow lava]

Danke

[indigo bear]

No problem. But as a note, if you have specific type of vocab you want to learn, then you might need to choose differently. For example, for current slang usage, you would need something like... vlogs and podcasts, for example.

[cobalt aurora]

I'll be attending an Ausbildung interview soon so it's better I look for some formal content

[fallow lava]

Ic, i forgot about that ty

[cobalt aurora]

Maybe some simple philosophy related stuff

[indigo bear]

I'd say philosophy tends to be a little too specific. Like often a philosophy text will use its own vocab that isn't really used anywhere else.

Of course it's fine to read it if you're interested in that.

But I would expect the vocab to be broad but not really as useful in other contects.

[cobalt aurora]

Oh na, no problem, you're right

Probably tagesschau is the way then xD

That one seems to be quite popular with Germans

[plush locust]

Critical Theory for normal people (e.g., Hartmut Rosas essayistic texts like Unverfügbarkeit) could be manageable if you're interested in the kind of topic. But that doesn't have anything to do with an Ausbildung.

[astral yoke]

For news Tagesschau or Heute(Journal) {ARD/ZDF}

[hollow umbra]

Yeah, "die Menschen wollen die DDR ausziehen" means "the people want to undress the GDR".
"Ausziehen" meaning "leave" is only "aus einer Wohnung ausziehen", but usually not from a country. "Das Land verlassen", or more dramatically "aus dem Land fliehen"

[winter kayak]

News and Sachbücher, stuff like that

[arctic arrow]

Hello guys, does anyone know any good german movies that i can watch as i want to learn german in an interactive way. I'm still on A1 level lol

[hollow umbra]

If you're A1 I recommend unironically Peppa Wutz (=Peppa Pig), very easy to understand, talking slowly, explaining everything, and it's actually funny

[rapid mortar]

Hi everyone, I'm from Poland and I need to do my German homework. Would anyone be willing to help me?

[indigo bear]

What help do you need?

[rapid mortar]

I need someone to do them correctly bc this is very important to me

[indigo bear]

When is it due?

[rapid mortar]

2 weeks

But it’s just 10 exercises

[indigo bear]

Okay, well, we can help you understand the ideas but we can't do it for you.

What are you stuck on?

[rapid mortar]

Bro I have to pass this

[indigo bear]

Bro we're happy to help you pass it. But first step is explaining what you're stuck on.

[rapid mortar]

Everything idk why I chose German over Spanish

[indigo bear]

Okay, what's the first exercise? What's the topic of it?

[rapid mortar]

Reading text and then deciding if sentences under are true or false

[indigo bear]

Okay, and what part of that do you have trouble with?

[rapid mortar]

Understanding text

[indigo bear]

Which dictionary do you use?

[rapid mortar]

Google

[indigo bear]

Google is not a dictionary.

[rapid mortar]

Lmao

[indigo bear]

faq dict

[livid steeple]

What does this word mean?

The best way to understand the meaning of a word is to use a dictionary. Monolingual dictionaries such as dwds.de, de.wiktionary.org and duden.de will often provide the most accurate definitions and examples for a word. If you are not yet comfortable with using a monolingual dictionary, bilingual dictionaries are also an option (dict.cc, dict.leo.org, pons.com).

The key here is to empower yourself to find the answer on your own. Using the many examples provided in dictionaries like DWDS, Wiki and Duden can help you confidently understand the word, and how to use it. If you still have trouble; don't worry! You can use #questions, #questions-2 or the #942470380692590632 to ask someone for further clarification.

[indigo bear]

Here are some options.

What's the first sentence in the text?

[rapid mortar]

I mean it’s mail between friends

[indigo bear]

Okay. What's the first sentence you don't understand?

[rapid mortar]

Du warst schon im urlaub nicht wahr

[indigo bear]

Are there any words there you don't know?

[rapid mortar]

Like most of them

[indigo bear]

Tell me which ones.

[rapid mortar]

I only know du and nicht

[indigo bear]

Okay. So you haven't seen schon before?

[rapid mortar]

Maybe I had but I don’t remember

[indigo bear]

Okay, try looking it up and tell me what it means.

[rapid mortar]

Already ?

[indigo bear]

Yes.

What about Urlaub?

[rapid mortar]

Holiday

Summer holiday

[indigo bear]

And "warst"?

[rapid mortar]

Was

Were you on holiday already ?

[indigo bear]

Yes.

[rapid mortar]

😛😛

[indigo bear]

More like: didn't you go on vacation already?

Okay, so you were able to understand the sentence on your own just by looking up the words you don't know.

Have a go at doing that for the whole exercise and ask here if you get stuck on something.

[rapid mortar]

Okay this one is not a big problem

But next one is about writing als or wenn in sentences

What is the difference between als and wenn

[indigo bear]

Usually for this topics the difference is about present and past tense.

Wenn means "if/when". So for example, "When I go to work, I take the train" or something. You can use "wenn" for that. But if it's past tense, you use als. For example, "Als ich Kind war" = when I was a kid.

But if it's a habitual/repeating event in the past, you use "wenn" for that.

Like "every time I went to school, I took the train".

So it's like this:
wenn -> present or future
als -> past (single event)
wenn -> past (repeating event)

[rapid mortar]

Okay next one is ab creating sentences from given words

Can u remind me the structure of sentence and question

[indigo bear]

Sure. The main thing is, in a main clause or simple statement, the finite verb (the one conjugated to match the subject) is in the 2nd position.

In a question, it's in the first position. But if there's a question word, the question word is added to the start.

faq word order

[livid steeple]

Word Order for Verbs

Word Order - Verbs

The placement of the finite verb (or conjugated verb) is very important to the structure of a German sentence. While most other elements in a sentence can be moved, the position of the finite verb is fixed.

🔸 Main clause
A main clause is an independent clause that makes sense by itself. Here the finite verb is always the second element.

Der Mann gibt der Frau das Buch.

An auxiliary/modal verb (e.g. müssen) replaces the original verb (called the main verb) as the finite verb and results in the main verb being placed at the end of the clause. Additionally, the main verb is returned to its infinitive or past participle form, depending on the tense.

Der Mann muss der Frau das Buch geben.

🔸 Questions & Statements
The finite verb is always the first element.

Siehst du den Ausgang?

Interrogative words (or w-words) are considered to be in the zeroth position.

Worauf wartet ihr?

Auxiliary/modal verbs have the same effect as before:

Kannst du den Ausgang sehen?
Worauf habt ihr gewartet?

🔸 Subordinate clause
A subordinate clause depends on a main clause to make sense. It is often introduced by a conjunction as the first element and the finite verb is usually the last element.

Ich bin nicht zur Arbeit gefahren, weil ich krank war.
Du könntest ihm helfen, statt dich nur zu beschweren!

When a single auxiliary modal verb is introduced, it becomes the finite verb and the main verb is placed before it::

Er ist sich immer noch nicht sicher, ob er ihr alles erzählen soll.

If a double infintive is present, it is placed at the end and the finite verb comes before it.

Das ist das Haus, das ich hätte verkaufen sollen.

[indigo bear]

Here's a summary for reference.

[rapid mortar]

Wait I have to go for a while brb

Thanks for now !

[remote bridge]

ah, never knew about modals.

[kindred forge]

Can I ask about this grammar things more? What is name of grammar like that?

[winter kayak]

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topikalisierung

[kindred forge]

Ohhh danke

[eternal verge]

if you want to watch some german videos to get used to the language, how do you even find videos for the beginner level

[winter kayak]

suche mit 'A1' oder 'Beginner'/'Anfänger'

[eternal verge]

danke

[hollow pasture]

sind Laden und Geschäft vollständig Synonyme?

[winter kayak]

nö

[rapid mortar]

would anyone like to check if everything is correct?

[cold stratus]

are there any anki decks for the dative verbs or commonly used verbs for B1? I am trying to create my own, but I feel it would take up to much time that I would rather spend studying

[winter kayak]

sieht gut aus

[glacial crag]

no, there's no deck that targets dative verbs

or verbs specifically for b1 and above

but, there's one deck that was made specifically for b1 (not a frequency or verb exclusive deck)

there's also a few good freq decks with a lot of verbs in them but verbs aren't the majority

[cold stratus]

guess ill have to choose verbs from my book and make them into flashcards

lol

[silent totem]

ich habe nur ein bisschen so Verben gelernt. Vor allem lese ich viel Artikel. Das hilft mir mehr bei dem Erlernen der Verben.

[jovial remnant]

sagt man

ich möchte nicht mein ganzes Leben arbeiten

oder soll ich eher sagen

ich möchte nicht mein ganzes Leben lang arbeiten.

Ich bin mir nicht sicher, in welchen Fällen das Wort "lang" genutzt werden soll

[glacial crag]

you can also find them online, if you're interested to at least

[hollow pasture]

was ist der Unterschied dazwischen

[cold stratus]

ja, ich habe eine Liste von `German For English Speakers´´. Ich meine eher, die Liste Publik ist.

[hollow umbra]

Both is fine

[frigid tinsel]

I would highly suggest making your own based on the ones you find in your reading or listening material.

It's always easier to learn vocabulary when you have practical examples around the same time as Anki.

[cold stratus]

thanks for that. right now, I add cards based upon wether I find them useful or not.

[frigid tinsel]

But yeah, premade lists are also good for additional study when you feel lazy. But I'd recommend to really try making at least some of your own cards.

[frigid tinsel]

Do you have a frequency list? That's my source of additional words when I have no idea where to go.

Mine is: https://www.routledge.com/A-Frequency-Dictionary-of-German-Core-Vocabulary-for-Learners/Tschirner-Mohring/p/book/9781138659780

[cold stratus]

no i don't. I comb through a book that was lent to me aplhabetically and do it that way

[frigid tinsel]

It includes a list of verbs.

But not Dativ verbs.

You'd have to do additional lookups but it's probably best to start with at least the base of verbs??

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Frequency_lists/German

Wiktionary also has a free set of frequency lists

[remote bridge]

Hm, is using modal verbs such as “müssen” make what’s after nominative or accusative?
I’ve been taught “Ich muss ‘chore’”, such as “Ich muss das Bett machen”.
If it doesn’t make it accusative, I’m guessing it’s because of verbs after that declare it nominative or accusative, such as ‘machen’ in the sentence above.

Also, I’m guessing sentence order can change depending if it’s a question?

[indigo bear]

Yes, machen makes the object accusative.

[indigo bear]

Yes, the verb position changes.

[remote bridge]

but, is using das here correct?

[indigo bear]

There aren't that many dative verbs. Here's a list: https://germanforenglishspeakers.com/reference/dative-verbs/

[remote bridge]

Wait, it would.

Since die and das aren’t changed. Always think of den looking at accusative so

[indigo bear]

Yes.

[indigo bear]

Exactly, only masculine changes in accusative, but Bett is neuter.

[remote bridge]

yep

[remote bridge]

I’m also guessing verb rules still apply. Other verbs have to go at the end still and the main verb is the one starting in a question.
“Kannst du Deutsch sprechen?”
and not:
“Kannst du sprichst Deutsch?”

probably would make the last one not sense since ‘Kannst’ is already taking from ‘du’ here.

[unique lion]

silly question: is Kek or Plätzchen how you would say cookie? or are they both types of cookies?
also, if you said Kekchen I don't think thats a real word, but if it was, what would that mean (roughly, without a direct translation?)

[indigo bear]

Yes. That's correct.

[remote bridge]

What I learned in school was “ein parr Kekse”, which is “a few cookies”, and Plätzchen is also a cookie , but more as a traditional cookie from what I found searching. So both mean cookies, but Keks is more generic. They also both mean biscuits too.

[unique lion]

thanks!

[remote bridge]

traditional in this context meaning a holiday

[frigid tinsel]

ein paar.

[remote bridge]

typo

[frigid tinsel]

Also, do you know the difference between ein paar vs Das Paar?

[frigid tinsel]

Plural Dativ uses den btw.

mit den Kindern (with the (Dativ) children).

[remote bridge]

ein paar is “a few” and das Paar seems like “the few”, although I may be wrong and befuddled.

[frigid tinsel]

Germans did the same thing English did with couple.

ein paar is a couple of (aka, 3 or more).

Das Paar is The Couple, aka 2 things exactly.

[remote bridge]

I can see how that’s confused

[frigid tinsel]

Except Germans did that with paar / pair.

It's a vocab thing. Nothing to be confused with. Just making sure you don't fall over a few traps I fell into earlier lol.

All these special cases make for constant annoyances as you learn though lol.

[remote bridge]

It doesn’t seem like you have to deal with Dative that much except when you deal with Dative verbs

[frigid tinsel]

mit is always a Dativ preposition and is quite common.

Prepositons have a whole Dativ vs accusative thing. Just a preview for the future again.

It's complex, but the point is you definitely need to be very good with both Dativ and Akkusativ, and Nominative. Even at the beginner level.

[remote bridge]

I don’t pay attention a lot to English grammar, I just make words and sentences. Having to kinda pay attention to German prepositions is probably harder.

[frigid tinsel]

The joke is that learning a foreign language improves your first language, lol. Because you have to think about all these things that came naturally to you

[remote bridge]

In other words, prepositions are probably one of the harder parts with Dativ case.

Verbs are probably the hardest.

[remote bridge]

I’ll probably look at this frequency list you linked earlier. You gotta know words if you wanna know a language.

[frigid tinsel]

Warning: do not attempt a frequency list as a complete beginner. I got extremely stuck early on. Some of the most common words in a language are also the most complex. (ex: English has therefore, thereto, somehow, somewhat.... German has daran, darauf, irgendwie, irgendwas...)

Or if you DO go with a frequency list, just remember that you'll be hitting like B1+ or AP German level words earlier than you expect. Maybe skip them if it feels too hard/confusing?

Furthermore, some of the easiest beginner words, like Fireman or Police Officer, are like Frequency#3500++ or later.

[indigo bear]

There's nothing wrong with beginners using frequency lists.

[frigid tinsel]

Come on man. You in particular keep pinging me for asking questions above my level. Almost all of those questions came from the frequency list words + their associated sentences.

I don't come up with those questions in isolation. It's from the frequency list.

[indigo bear]

Everyone is different.

[frigid tinsel]

Look, if he wants the frequency list he can take that path. I did it. I'm into the easy part of the frequency list now. But I think the fair warning about hitting B1+ level concepts accidentally will always apply.

It's a good tool.

But any beginner looking at the tool needs to know the downsides of said tool.

[indigo bear]

But you said "Warning: do not attempt a frequency list as a complete beginner." And your reasoning was because you got stuck.

If you had just said "Be careful because there is advanced vocab in frequency lists" that's fine. But telling someone "Do NOT use this resource because I got stuck when I used it" is something I have to step in to correct.

[frigid tinsel]

Ah, h that's how it is.

[indigo bear]

@frigid tinsel If you try to start a fight again, you will be muted.

This is your only warning.

Anyway, to finish what I was saying, this is another one of those things where people who are either easily overwhelmed or can get a bit perfectionist about understanding everything are more likely to get stuck. Whereas people who either have experience learning another language or have awareness of their limitations or can adapt easily to uncertainty can make use of those kinds of tools.

It's similar to how some people can learn freely from random sources but other people need a structured course. And most people need something in between.

[stray panther]

can someone just explain word order to me like im a infant child

[remote bridge]

I’m not a complete beginner, and I already had common sense of what a “frequency” list is.

(I’m not arguing)

[indigo bear]

As a beginner you just need to know where the verbs go.

[indigo bear]

#questions message

Read that first and then ask if you have more questions.

[stray panther]

thank you 😊

[fallen thicket]

im not sure what level i am, i think im A2 but idk if someone could help me find out or give me a quiz online to tell what i am

[indigo bear]

faq cefr

[livid steeple]

CEFR levels

If you see something like A1, B2 or C1, these represent the proficiency of a speaker in a language they're not native in, and are called CEFR levels. They are valid for any language, not only German!
Roughly speaking, A levels are beginners and C levels are experts. Remember that CEFR level are self-assessed and indicative!
You can see more specific names and descriptions on the Wikipedia page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages

🗨 How do I know what level I am?
If the table on Wikipedia is too generic for you, you can try using this one here:
https://rm.coe.int/168045bb52
Just check each column one at a time: if you can do all it describes, move to the next column. Your level is the highest where you can do the most things.

Alternatively, you can use this questionnaire to estimate your level more accurately:
https://rm.coe.int/self-assessment-checklists-from-the-swiss-version-of-the-european-lang/1680492f8e

[remote bridge]

Do modal verbs also make ‘I’ and ‘he/she’ pronouns the same verb form?

Such as “muss”?

[frigid tinsel]

https://learngerman.dw.com/en/placement-test-a2/l-36697405

Most language schools have a placement test to figure out your level.

[frigid tinsel]

1st person present (ich) and 3rd person present (er/sie/es/man) are conjugated the same for wollen (will), dürfen (darf), sollen (soll), mögen (mag), können (kann).

[remote bridge]

ah

uh, how the heck do you figure that out lol

[frigid tinsel]

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dürfen

[frigid tinsel]

Wiktionary has a very good conjugation table for verbs.

Including the modal verbs you were interested in.

[indigo bear]

Figure out what?

[remote bridge]

What he said, if it works for both first and third person. Unless muss and müssen both have different meanings

[indigo bear]

They have the same meaning.

[remote bridge]

Exactly, yet muss doesn’t need any conjugation for talking about someone else and not yourself. It just seems interesting

[frigid tinsel]

muss is the conjugated form of müssen.

[remote bridge]

What I mean is
“Ich muss”
“Er muss”
Both use the same conjugation. I’m wondering how that works. It is a modal verb.

It’s probably more deep and technical.

[indigo bear]

There's nothing special you need to know for how it works. But later when you learn Präteritum you will see how that has the same feature.

So there's probably some historical connection there for how it evolved.

[remote bridge]

Thought it would.

[indigo bear]

Like for example:
Ich war = I was
Er war = He was

[jovial jackal]

is there any word for "people who have ever been afflicted by ___ disease, whether dead or alive"? specifically cardiac arrest (Herzstillstand) for my essay

[astral yoke]

this looks rather like a sentence
or do you seek for a word that fits in the __ ?
If so, then what is your German sentence? 🤔

[jovial jackal]

"Herzstillstand ist zwar eine tödliche Krankheit; dennoch in einigen Fällen könnten wir Personen, die Herzstillstand betrifft, retten."
i just settled for this in the end, is this fine?

[sleek pebble]

just use betroffene or erkrankte

btw i’m not sure herzstillstand is so much a disease as it is a condition or a symptom

[astral yoke]

I wouldn't call it a disease, ^^

[jovial jackal]

oh right 😅 tödliches Symptom then, thanks all

[sleek pebble]

„Herzstillstand ist zwar meist tödlich, dennoch können wir Betroffene in einigen Fällen retten.“ is what i would write

[astral yoke]

Just use Phänomen / Symptom / ^^

[astral yoke]

BTW that is the reason, why we have many defibrillators in public places!

[sleek pebble]

we do?

[astral yoke]

But ofc! In places where there are gatherings at least. Like meeting halls, town halls, shopping centers and the like.

[winter stream]

It is indeed a historical artifact, a feature of the modal verbs and the verb wissen that their presents inflect like other verbs' preterite, in that the first and third person singular are endingless, rather than ending in -e and -t respectively.
Historically, the modal verbs (and the verb wissen 'to know') continue what are called “stative verbs”, referring to states (abilities) of someone rather than actions they performed, and the form that these stative verbs used is the same that became the preterite of (strong, ablauting) action verbs.
Of course this original semantic distinction is no longer relevant nowadays, there's just a small, fixed set of verbs that inherit this behavior.
And as it happens, the third person of this type is formed without a -t in the third person, the -t is only a feature of the 'original' third person present tense, which stative verbs (=modern modal verbs and wissen) didn't use, and the vowels that they once did end in have long since disappeared leading to identical forms between 1sg and 3sg. not that you need this knowledge for anything ever, but since you asked.

oops, critical historical terminology error: preterite not perfect [fixed now]

You can broadly make a chart like this
umlaut: change of a→ä, u→ü, o→ö and, in this context, also e→i(e) (lesen, sie liest; geben, er gibt)
ablaut: a different historical vowel change, a bit pointless to summarise as there's a greater variety of correspondences

[indigo bear]

Just adding this point a bit more clearly for any beginner who reads this: this is NOT necessary info for learning German, this is linguistics stuff.

[winter stream]

on a good day it might prevent hypercorrect “ich weiße” i guess 😹

but yeah, no

[hollow umbra]

"Ich weiße die Wand" 😝https://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/weißen

[fathom nymph]

Guys is Duolingo a good app to study German..😥

[winter stream]

sure, distinctly not the form im thinking about but yeah :p

[glacial crag]

no

you can still use it if it's fun but don't treat it as your main learning tool

[sleek pebble]

ist das komma da notwendig?

ich kann nicht entscheiden, ob mir das richtig oder falsch scheint

[oblique snow]

mMn nicht nur nicht notwendig, sondern einfach falsch

[sleek pebble]

dachte ich mir

sieht irgendwie (für mich deutschen) so willkürlich aus wie kommas im englischen

[winter stream]

vorgeschobene Adverbialphrasen werden im Deutschen nicht abgekommat, im Englischen hingegen schon

[fathom nymph]

Oh, where do I learn German?

[blazing sapphire]

Any easy way to understand and practice nominative, accusative, dative?? 🥲

[winter stream]

so ungefähr das einzige mal, wo das Englische ein Komma braucht und es im Deutschen definitiv nicht gesetzt wird

[sleek pebble]

ok also bin ich nicht verrückt

[oblique snow]

faq how to get started

[livid steeple]

How to get started

The simplest way to learn German is to find topics you don’t understand yet and search for explanations of them. This list provides you with a guide for which topics to learn if you are completely new to German. Type the topic into Google (or YouTube) and start learning!

Introduction

1: Alphabet (especially ä, ü, ö and ß)
2: Basic greetings (hello, goodbye, etc.)

Part 1 - Simple Sentence

1: Noun gender & plurals
2: Nominative case (What are cases?)
3: Nominative pronouns (I, you, he, she, etc.)
4: Verbs in present tense
5: Definite/indefinite articles
6: Accusative case (for nouns)
7: Accusative pronouns
8: Word order of simple sentences
9: How to ask questions

See Part 2 on the next page.

Tips

• Always learn the gender of a noun when you learn a new noun
• Learn to use a translation dictionary (e.g. dict.cc, leo.org)
• Use >faq resources to see our list of German learning resources
• For listening and pronunciation practice, try watching movies or videos (incl. YouTube)
• You can listen to pronunciation for words on websites like dict.cc, forvo.com, and others
• Practice writing sentences every day (and asking people to correct them)
• Ask as many questions as possible
• Don’t be scared to make mistakes!!!! If you don’t let yourself make mistakes, you will never be able to learn German

Page 1/2

[fathom nymph]

Oh thanks!

[oblique snow]

also see #resources

[sleek pebble]

das und , too.

[indigo bear]

You kinda learn it in multiple steps. Where are you at right now with it?

[winter stream]

hah, stimmt!

[sleek pebble]

das habe ich wirklich nie verstanden. aber wird wohl auch gewohnheit sein, dass mir deutsche kommasetzung am systematischsten und logischsten erscheint, obwohl es manchmal auch etwas viel werden kann, vor allem in schachtelsätzen.

[blazing sapphire]

Long story short, I just pushed through the courses and heavily relied on them. Now I'm taking a B2 course and I find it quite difficult honestly 🥲. I might be in reality at A2 or at early B1 level. It sucks that I came to this realization very late but I'm trying my best to catch up

[indigo bear]

Okay, so you're already comfortable with using cases in basic sentences?

Like nominative being the subject?

[blazing sapphire]

Somewhat, yeah

[indigo bear]

Okay, sounds good.

So basically there are 3 topics you have to learn.

[blazing sapphire]

Mhm?

[sleek pebble]

und konstruktionen wie:
„der grund, wieso das geschieht, ist, dass…“ - wo das „ist“ etwas klaustrophobisch wirkt, so als müsste man es eigentlich befreien :DDD

[indigo bear]

• Verbs with 1 object
• Verbs with 2 objects
• Prepositions (which is also in two topics: single-case prepositions and two-way prepositions)

For verbs with 2 objects, that's things like geben. Do you know how to use cases with those verbs already?

[blazing sapphire]

Like can you give me some examples?

[indigo bear]

Actually, first, I forgot to clarify. Are you talking about when to use the cases? Or are you talking about the declension patterns?

[blazing sapphire]

When to use cases ig..like I can't identify when to use meiner, meine, Dem, den, and so onn

[indigo bear]

So do you know which case and gender "dem" is for?

[blazing sapphire]

Honestly? Can't remember

[indigo bear]

Okay. That means you need to learn both. You need to learn when to use each case, and you also need to learn the declension patterns.

[blazing sapphire]

I see 😭

[indigo bear]

So going back to "when to use each case", an example of "verb with 2 objects" is geben.

Ich gebe dem Mann das Buch.

The subject is nominative: ich.
The direct object is accusative: das Buch.
The indirect object is dative: dem Mann.

[blazing sapphire]

Gotcha, Mann and buch are the 2 objects here ryt?

[indigo bear]

Yes.

[blazing sapphire]

Ooh I get it

[indigo bear]

Okay, good.

For verbs with 1 object, it's different. You have to memorise the case needed.

Most verbs go with accusative, so you just memorise which ones go with dative (or nominative or genitive).

So for example, things like essen, trinken, sehen, etc. all go with accusative.

[blazing sapphire]

Can you provide some resources for this pls? 😭

[indigo bear]

Ich sehe den Mann.

[blazing sapphire]

I see

[indigo bear]

Like you don't want an explanation but just a resource?

[blazing sapphire]

I mean the dative verbs, are there any resources where I can get access to all of them? For memorization ofc

[indigo bear]

Yes.

[blazing sapphire]

Also yess you can go ahead with the explanation too

[indigo bear]

https://germanforenglishspeakers.com/reference/dative-verbs/

Just memorise whichever ones you want from there.

The usual one learners learn first is helfen.

Ich helfe dem Mann.

[blazing sapphire]

Okay! 👌

[indigo bear]

Ich sehe den Mann. Ich helfe dem Mann.

And for that, you just memorise that helfen is a dative verb.

[blazing sapphire]

Makes sense

[indigo bear]

For nominative, you have special verbs call "copular verbs": sein, werden, bleiben, heißen.

For example, ich bin ein Mann.

Sein goes with nominative.

Mainly you just have to remember it for sein and werden, "to be" and "to become".

[blazing sapphire]

Gotcha

[indigo bear]

There are also genitive verbs but they're not common so you don't have to go out of your way to learn them. Maybe just keep an eye out in case the B2 content has some later.

Then the big topic is prepositions. You probably learned a lot of it already.

Like "mit" always goes with dative.

Do you know about that?

[blazing sapphire]

Maybe I did but can't remember 😭

[blazing sapphire]

My foundation is pretty messed up

[indigo bear]

You can also memorise that pretty easily.

There are songs too that some people like to use to help them learn them. You can search on youtube for that if you're interested.

[blazing sapphire]

I'll do that 💯

[indigo bear]

The ones in the middle in orange are two-way prepositions. As you can see, they change cases depending on if they answer "wo?" or "wohin?"

[blazing sapphire]

Mhmm i got that

[indigo bear]

Do you need more explanation on that or do you know it?

[blazing sapphire]

I think I'll first go through all this, thanks for the explanation 😭

[indigo bear]

No problem.

faq akk dat

[livid steeple]

accusative vs dative

Both accusative case and dative case are used for objects in a sentence. This FAQ explains when to use each case. It’s recommended to learn and practice each of the following subtopics separately.

Verbs with 1 Object

For the majority of verbs, they have one object and the object is accusative. However, sometimes the object is dative. For example, "helfen": “Ich helfe dir.” You can find a list of these dative verbs here. Rarely, verbs also have genitive objects, but this is so uncommon that you don’t need to actively learn them.

Verbs with 2 Objects

For verbs with 2 objects, the following rule typically applies: the direct object is accusative and the indirect object is dative. For example: Ich gebe dem Mann das Buch. A very small number of verbs have 2 accusative objects. The only common example of that is “lehren”.

Prepositions with 1 Case

For most prepositions, you can just memorise which case the prepositions uses. For example, “mit” always has a dative object while “ohne” always has an accusative object.

Two-Way Prepositions

Some prepositions can have either an accusative or dative object, depending on the exact meaning. The basic explanation is that dative objects are for describing the location of something, while accusative is used to describe a change of location. Specifically, in the accusative version, the person/object starts in one place and ends in a different place.

Dative (location): Ich bin im Haus. (I am in the house.)
Accusative (change of location): Ich gehe in das Haus. (I walk into the house.)

Please note that the accusative version does not mean “movement”. Movement that happens all in one location will still be dative.

Dative (location): Ich gehe im Park. (I am walking inside the park.)
Accusative (change of location): Ich gehe in den Park. (I go to the park./I walk into the park.)

Other Resources

Visual diagram of these rules: [Link to post](#questions message)
Diagram of common prepositions: [Link to post](#questions message)

[indigo bear]

Here's an overview. Feel free to use it any time.

And here are free worksheets: https://www.nthuleen.com/teach/grammar.html

[blazing sapphire]

Man you're a saviour 😭

[indigo bear]

Declension is a separate topic though that you will also have to review.

Here's a guide that helps with declension.

faq adjective declension

[livid steeple]

Adjective Declension

A Brief Guide to Memorizing German Noun and Adjective Declension by Basementality
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jWl5-kkqF3FQLDzrz8XLBJj7hvPFQK7MT5SYEDGK65E/edit

[indigo bear]

That's what we're here for. Feel free to ask any time you have questions or want to check your understanding.

[blazing sapphire]

Kayy I'll check it out as well

[indigo bear]

And don't rush through it all. Just learn one thing at a time.

[blazing sapphire]

I definitely will do that! This is def a great server! I'll try to be active more often

Also, do you think I can catch up in about 3 months? If I, lets say study German for 2 hrs everyday?

[indigo bear]

That's hard to say. I guess it depends how much knowledge that stuck in your past studies. Sometimes it's hidden in there and just needs to be refreshed. But it could also be that you have some big gaps that take more time to work through.

It's definitely possible though and 2 hours a day is a good amount.

[blazing sapphire]

Yeah that makes sense

[indigo bear]

If you can do a bit extra on free days, that's a good idea.

[blazing sapphire]

Tru!

Gotta remain consistent tho 😭 thats the hardest part

[indigo bear]

Very true. And I suggest focussing on the foundational stuff until you feel comfortable with it.

All the A1-B1 grammar especially.

Because if you miss some vocab, you can always pick that back up as you go.

[blazing sapphire]

right! Thanks again! 🙏

[tough igloo]

Hi, may I ask some German grammartical question in this chat?

[winter kayak]

yes

[tough igloo]

Thank you. I was just reading some B1-level sentence today, and I found the below sentence.

Wie werden Samstag früh entscheiden, ob es sich lohnt Sushi zu kaufen und draußen zu essen.

My question is that shouldn't there be a comma " , " in between lohnt and Sushi, or the verb "lohnt" be put at the end of sentence? (e.g. Ich weiß nicht, ob er heute kommt)

[winter kayak]

I'm not an expert on the rules of commas, but you defintely could put a comma between lohnt and Sushi, to separate the 'ob'-clause from the 'zu'-clause.

Putting lohnt at the end would not work

[indigo bear]

I think this specific type of comma is optional and you tend to use it or not use it depending on readability considerations.

[astral yoke]

My OLD German brain thinks: there has to be a comma 🤷‍♂️

[tough igloo]

Thank you for you answer everyone. But shouldn't the verb be put at the end? Is "zu essen" used as a verb?

Hm.. maybe I should simply take it that they are kind of free

[winter kayak]

zu-clauses include infinitives but no conjugated verbs. The conjugated verb that "goes to the end" in your sentence is lohnt, which is actually at the end of its clause

[tough igloo]

Sorry for being persistent. You mean ob-clause by which is actually at the end its clause?

[winter kayak]

yeah

[tough igloo]

I see. But you don't necessarily need to put a comma in between the two clauses?

[indigo bear]

It depends on which structure is being used.

Generally if the zu infinitive depends on a noun or adjective, you need a comma, but if it depends on a verb, it's often optional.

For example: es macht Spaß, Deutsch zu lernen. This comma is mandatory because the zu infinitive is dependent on Spaß.

[tough igloo]

Oh, I see!

Actually, which is more natural to put a comma or leave it out in my sentence?

[sleek pebble]

i would put one

[barren kettle]

Ja ich stimme zu. Deutsch ist eine schöne Sprache

Deutsch ist sehr einfach

Wir müssen es lernen

[leaden echo]

Is “wandern gehen” correct, or rather more correct than simply saying “Ich möchte wandern“ alone?

in other circumstances it accepts it without gehen so I was wondering the difference

[barren kettle]

I would like to go hiking

I would like to hike

Not much difference

[frigid tinsel]

Grammatik aktiv by Cornelsen covers A1 through B1 concepts. It's 85 exercises. One per day is close to three months.... If you are "really" somewhere in A2 that's still 40ish exercises to review.

Two random pages to give an example of it's material:

The B1 material is around 30 pages. I don't know if it covers all of B1.

[blazing sapphire]

That's really helpful! I'll check it out thanks 🙏

[frigid tinsel]

Your specific question seems to be exercise 40.

[ivory rain]

I used this book for grammar and passed b1 it is sufficient. There were no grammar topics missing that this book did not Cover. Maybe except some prepositions for verbs

Very good book

[glacial crag]

this isn't a question, just wanna say thank you for helping people :)

I remember joining the server and asking you + lolo very basic questions, and other people too later on

and you guys were really nice when answering them, regardless of how silly some of them might've sounded

[surreal lake]

guys question thoughts on the goethe institute and their grading exams and system

[indigo bear]

Thank you as well! It's not only very fun to help people with German but your questions help other learners too. There's always people reading along who are too nervous to ask the same questions.

[surreal lake]

as someone who usually lurks and doesnt ask i can confirm

[jovial remnant]

Is there a difference really between these two example sentences:

Beim Joggen reicht eine gute Lauftechnik nicht aus.

1- Man braucht dabei viel Ausdauer [auch]
2- Man braucht dabei [auch] viel Ausdauer.

[winter kayak]

2 sounds good, 1 sounds bad?

[glacial crag]

Can I use Konjunktiv I without a statement that signals a different viepoint from anyone?
-Er sagte, er habe Zeit
-er habe Zeit

-Sie sagen, die Schule sei so groß
-die Schule sei so groß

[winter kayak]

a bit confused.
the first bullet point is correct on both. What is the second supposed to be?

[glacial crag]

they're saying the school is really big

[elder turtle]

I have another question related with Konjunktiv II.

Why in this excercise the solution is "hätten" instead of "wären"?

[winter kayak]

sorry, I mean that 'Er sagte, er habe Zeit' and 'Sie sagen, die Schule sei so groß' are both fine. The second bullet point I do not understand what it is

[winter kayak]

you form past tense with modalverbs (sollen) with haben not sein

[idle sable]

bashie wants to know if the 'er sagte' part is necessary or not

[elder turtle]

Ach sooo!

Genau

Danke

[idle sable]

ive heard K1 without that part when its obvious what the source is

[winter kayak]

oh, then it doesn't really work without the context of who said it. It doesn't have to stand directly before K1, but with nothing it's weird.

[glacial crag]

so that means it's possible if there's context, hm

(if it's obvious enough)

actually, what about this

[idle sable]

wo ist dein freund?
er habe wieder viel zu tun

here it works imo

from context its clear that its reported speech

[glacial crag]

-Was meint dein Freund dazu?

-Er denkt, die Idee sei toll
-die Idee sei toll

would it be weird to be omit the er denkt here

[glacial crag]

oh you already answered lol

okay that's good to know, I'll keep that in mind

thank you guys so much!

[idle sable]

here you can also just start with "dass die idee toll sei" thats what id say

(here you're being directly asked for reported speech, in my example that's not the case)

[glacial crag]

I actually didn't think about this, thank you summe :)

[barren kettle]

Is deinetwegen more emotionally detatched than wegen dir

[tulip meteor]

Nah

[glacial crag]

„Das perfekte Abbildung, das Wort darzustellen“

do I have do use an um zu clause in this sentence?

keine Ahnung ob es passend ist

[idle sable]

die Abbildung

[glacial crag]

oh danke

und der „um..zu Teil“?
das Wort darzustellen, oder um das Wort darzustellen

[idle sable]

glaub "um... zu..." ist hier richtig

[glacial crag]

alright, schönen dank ^_^

[quick delta]

das Poster-der Poster
which one is the correct one?

[tawny fractal]

both apparently work but das is def more common, never heard der Poster tbh

[glacial crag]

dict.leo shows only the variation you've heard

aaand this + dwds show both

[tawny fractal]

yea that ones not that accurate, Duden also shows both

but yea, der isn't rlly used tbh so I'd just learn it with das

[jovial remnant]

Wenn sie ins Ausland ginge, würde sie mehr Geld verdienen

is "ginge" correct and natural or would you rather say "gehen würde"