Learning new words

[eager sierra]

Should I learn new words by translating them or by memorizing their meaning as given in german

[sage flax]

At the beginning wouldn't it be sort of difficult for you to remember the meaning by memorising the German definition? You won't really know the words in the definition. Or have I understood you wrong?

[eager sierra]

Yeah you are correct but when should one actually start using a dictionary?

[sage flax]

You can use a dictionary any time. Bilingual or monolingual

You should use the one that helps you actually understand the word.

I didn't start using a German dictionary until around B2/C1 personally. And I still sometimes stumble across an entry in dwds that I can't make heads or tails of, in which case I head to an English-German dictionary to clarify.

[eager sierra]

Oh

Your native language is English?

[sage flax]

yeah

like take the dwds entry for a very normal word "das Tuch" (assume I just mean a towel)

that's obviously not going to be an effective way for a learner, especially a beginner, to learn that 😂

[sand crown]

For some words, you can also learn them by other means, such as pictures.

As a beginner, pictures are a good way to help you learn words for objects.