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German Tips and Notes


Capitalizing nouns
In German, all nouns are capitalized. For example, "my name" is mein Name, and "the apple" is der Apfel. This helps you identify which
words are the nouns in a sentence.

German genders are strange


Nouns in German are either feminine, masculine or neuter. For example, Frau (woman) is feminine, Mann (man) is masculine, and Kind
(child) is neuter.

While some nouns (Frau, Mann, …) have natural gender like in English (a woman is female, a man is male), most nouns have grammatical
gender (depends on word ending, or seemingly random).

For example, Mädchen (girl) is neuter, because all words ending in -chen are neuter. Wasser (water) is neuter, but Cola is feminine, and Saft
(juice) is masculine.

It is important to learn every noun along with its gender because parts of German sentences change depending on the gender of their
nouns.

For now, just remember that the indefinite article (a/an) ein is used for masculine and neuter nouns, and eine is used for feminine nouns.
Stay with us to find out how "cases" will later modify these.

gender indefinite article

masculine ein Mann

neuter ein Mädchen

feminine eine Frau

Verb conjugations

Conjugating regular verbs


Verb conjugation in German is more complex than in English. To conjugate a regular verb in the present tense, identify the stem of the verb
and add the ending corresponding to any of the grammatical persons, which you can simply memorize. For now, here are the singular
forms:

Example: trinken (to drink)

English person ending German example

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English person ending German example

I -e ich trinke

you (singular informal) -st du trinkst

he/she/it -t er/sie/es trinkt

Conjugations of the verb sein (to be)


Like in English, sein (to be) is completely irregular, and its conjugations simply need to be memorized. Again, you will learn the plural forms
soon.

English German

I am ich bin

you (singular informal) are du bist

he/she/it is er/sie/es ist

Umlauts
Umlauts are letters (more specifically vowels) that have two dots above them and appear in some German words like Mädchen.

Literally, "Umlaut" means "around the sound," because its function is to change how the vowel sounds.

no umlaut umlaut

a ä

o ö

u ü

An umlaut change may change the meaning. That's why it's important not to ignore those little dots.

No continuous aspect
In German, there's no continuous aspect. There are no separate forms for "I drink" and "I am drinking". There's only one form: Ich trinke.

There's no such thing as Ich bin trinke or Ich bin trinken!

When translating into English, how can I tell whether to use the simple (I drink) or the continuous form (I am drinking)?

Unless the context suggests otherwise, either form should be accepted.

Definite articles
As mentioned in Basics 1, German nouns have one of three genders: feminine, masculine or neuter .

While they sometimes correspond to a natural gender ("der Mann" is male), most often the gender will depend on the word, not on the
object it describes. For example, the word "das Mädchen" (the girl) ends in "-chen", hence it is neuter. This is called grammatical gender.

Each gender has its own definite article. Der is used for masculine nouns, das for neuter, and die for feminine. Later in this course you will

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learn that these might be modified according to "case".

gender definite (the) indefinite (a/an)

masculine der Mann ein Mann

neuter das Mädchen ein Mädchen

feminine die Frau eine Frau

Conjugating verbs
Here are the conjugation tables from "Basics 1" (where you can find a more detailed explanation) again.

trinken (to drink)

English person ending German example

I -e ich trinke

you (singular informal) -st du trinkst

he/she/it -t er/sie/es trinkt

sein (to be)

English German

I am ich bin

you (singular informal) are du bist

he/she/it is er/sie/es ist

Generic vs. specific (German is not Spanish or French)


Just like in English, using or dropping the definite article makes the difference between specific and generic .

I like bread = Ich mag Brot (bread in general)

I like the bread = Ich mag das Brot (specific bread)

A good general rule is to use an article when you would use on in English. If there is none in English, don't use one in German.

There are some slight differences when using a few abstract nouns, but we'll see about that later.

German plurals are also strange :)


In English, making plurals out of singular nouns is typically as straightforward as adding -(e)s at the end of the word. In German, the
transformation is more complex. You will learn details about this in a later lesson.

In some languages (such as French or Spanish), genders are also differentiated in the plural. In German, the plural form does not depend
on what gender the singular form is.

Regardless of grammatical gender, all plural nouns take the definite article die. (You will later learn how "cases" can modify this.) This does
not make them feminine. The grammatical gender of a word never changes. Like many other words, die is simply used for multiple purposes.

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Just like in English, there's no plural indefinite article.

English German

a man ein Mann

men Männer

You, you and you


Most languages use different words to address one person, or several people.

In German, when addressing a single person, use du:

Du bist mein Kind. (You are my child.)

If you are talking to more than one person, use ihr:

Ihr seid meine Kinder. (You are my children.)

Some English speakers would use "y'all" or "you guys" for this plural form of "you".

Note that these only work for people you are familiar with (friends, family, …). For others, you would use the formal "you", which we teach
later in this course. So stay tuned :)

Ihr vs. er
If you're new to German, ihr and er may sound confusingly similar, but there is actually a difference. ihr sounds similar to the English word
"ear", and er sounds similar to the English word "air" (imagine a British/RP accent).

Don't worry if you can't pick up on the difference at first. You may need some more listening practice before you can tell them apart. Also,
try using headphones instead of speakers.

Learn the pronouns together with the verb endings. This will greatly reduce the amount of ambiguity.

Verb conjugation
Here is the complete table for conjugating regular verbs:

Example: trinken (to drink)

English person ending German example

I -e ich trinke

you (singular informal) -st du trinkst

he/she/it -t er/sie/es trinkt

we -en wir trinken

you (plural informal) -t ihr trinkt

they -en sie trinken

Notice that the first and the third person plural have the same ending.

And here's the complete table for the irregular verb sein (to be):

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English German

I am ich bin

you (singular informal) are du bist

he/she/it is er/sie/es ist

we are wir sind

you (plural informal) are ihr seid

they are sie sind

You will learn about the distinction between "formal" and "informal" later (it's easy).

Common phrases
Commonly used phrases are often shortened versions of a longer sentence. Or they might be leftovers from some old grammar that has
otherwise fallen out of use. That means that their grammar might appear strange.

For now, just learn them like you would learn a long word.

Wie geht's?
There are many ways to ask someone how they are doing. Take "How are you?," "How do you do?" and "How is it going?" as examples. In
German, the common phrase or idiom uses the verb gehen (go): Wie geht es dir? (How are you?).

This can be shortened to Wie geht's?.

Willkommen can be a false friend


In German, Willkommen means welcome as in "Welcome to our home", but it does not mean welcome as in "Thank you - You're welcome".
The German for the latter is Gern geschehen (or just Gern!) or Keine Ursache.

Entschuldigung!
Sometimes, German words can be a mouthful. Later on, you will find that you can take long words apart, and recognize the meaning from its
elements.

Here's an example:

Part Meaning

ent- de-

Schuld guilt

-ig -y

-gung noun suffix

So, Entschuldigung literally means something like "deguiltification": "Take the guilt away from me" :)

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Duo
Duo is the name of Duolingo's mascot (the green owl). He will guide you through this course. If you make him happy, he will make you
happy :)

German Cases
In English, the words "he" and "I" can be used as subjects (the ones doing the action in a sentence), and they change to "him" and "me"
when they are objects (the ones the action is applied to). Here's an example:

Subject Verb Object

I see him

He sees me

This is called a grammatical case: the same word changes its form, depending on its relationship to the verb. In English, only pronouns have
cases. In German, most words other than verbs (such as nouns, pronouns, determiners, adjectives, etc.) have cases.

You'll learn more about cases later; for now you just need to understand the difference between the two simplest cases: nominative and
accusative.

The subject of a sentence (the one doing the action) is in the nominative case. So when we say Die Frau spielt. (The woman plays.), "die
Frau" is in the nominative.

The accusative object is the thing or person that is directly receiving the action. For example, in Der Mann sieht den Ball. (The man sees the
ball.), der Mann is the (nominative) subject and den Ball is the (accusative) object.

For the articles, nominative and accusative are nearly the same. Only the masculine ("der") forms change:

"a(n)" masc. neut. fem.

Nominative ein ein eine

Accusative einen ein eine

"the" m. n. f. pl.

Nom. der das die die

Acc. den das die die

Flexible sentence order


The fact that most words in German are affected by the case explains why the sentence order is more flexible than in English . For
example, you can say Das Mädchen hat den Apfel. (The girl has the apple.) or Den Apfel hat das Mädchen.. In both cases, den Apfel (the apple)
is the accusative object, and das Mädchen is the subject (always nominative).

However, take note that in German, the verb always has to be in position 2. If something other than the subject takes up position 1, the
subject will then move after the verb.

Normally, I drink water.


Normalerweise trinke ich Wasser.

Vowel change in some verbs

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A few common verbs change the vowel in the second and third person singular.

Here is the table for a verb without vowel change:

En. person person trinken

I ich trinke

you (sg.) du trinkst

he/she/it er/sie/es trinkt

we wir trinken

you (pl.) ihr trinkt

they sie trinken

And here are three verbs with that vowel change. Notice that in the first two verbs, the 2nd and 3rd person singular seem the same. This is
just because the du ending -st merged with the -s- of the verb stem. This is unrelated to the vowel change.

person lesen sprechen

ich lese spreche

du liest sprichst

er/sie/es liest spricht

wir lesen sprechen

ihr lest sprecht

sie lesen sprechen

Similarly, essen turns to du isst/er isst.

Sprechen (to speak) will be introduced in one of the next lessons.

Isst vs. ist


Isst and ist sound exactly the same. So do Es ist ein Apfel. and Es isst ein Apfel. sound the same?

Yes, but you can tell it's Es ist ein Apfel: Es isst ein Apfel is ungrammatical. The accusative of ein Apfel is einen Apfel. Hence, It is eating an
apple translates as Es isst einen Apfel .

Of course, this only works for masculine nouns. Other forms will look the same in nominative and accusative:

Er isst eine Banane.


Er ist eine Banane.

Only context will tell you here :)

Ich habe Brot


In English, you can say "I'm having bread" when you really mean that you're eating or about to eat bread. This does not work in German.
The verb haben refers to possession only. Hence, the sentence Ich habe Brot only translates to I have bread, not I'm having bread. Of
course, the same applies to drinks. Ich habe Wasser only translates to I have water, not I'm having water.

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Conjugation is also slightly irregular: two forms lose the -b-.

English person German example

I ich habe

you (sg.) du hast

he/she/it er/sie/es hat

we wir haben

you (pl.) ihr habt

they sie haben

Grammar break!
There is no new grammar in this lesson. If you're confused, you can review the grammar points from earlier lessons.

Harness the power of other learners


Or you can check the discussion that's available for each sentence. You can reach these when tapping or clicking on the speech bubble. Your
question might already have been answered there. Otherwise, you can leave a comment yourself.

Ich habe Hunger!


As mentioned in the "Accusative" lesson, haben is not used in the sense of "I'm having bread" or "I'm having tea" in German. Ich habe Brot
only translates to "I have bread".

German uses haben in some instances where English uses "to be":

Ich habe Hunger. (I am hungry.)

Ich habe Durst. (I am thirsty.)

Sie hat Recht. (She is right.)

Er hat Angst. (He is afraid.)

Compound words
A compound word is a word that consists of two or more words. These are written as one word (no spaces) .

The gender of a compound noun is always determined by its last element. This shouldn't be too difficult to remember, because the last
element is always the most important one. All the previous elements merely describe the last element.

die Autobahn (das Auto + die Bahn)

der Orangensaft (die Orange + der Saft)

das Hundefutter (der Hund + das Futter)

Sometimes, there's a connecting sound (Fugenlaut) between two elements.

die Orange + der Saft = der Orangensaft

der Hund + das Futter = das Hundefutter (the dog food)

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die Liebe + das Lied = das Liebeslied (the love song)

der Tag + das Gericht = das Tagesgericht (dish of the day)

Mittagessen — lunch or dinner?


We're aware that "dinner" is sometimes used synonymously with "lunch", but for the purpose of this course, we're defining Frühstück as
"breakfast", Mittagessen as "lunch", and "dinner/supper" as Abendessen / Abendbrot.

Cute like sugar!


The word süß means "sweet" when referring to food, and "cute" when referring to living beings.

Der Zucker ist süß. (The sugar is sweet.)


Die Katze ist süß. (The cat is cute.)

Does Gemüse mean "vegetable" or "vegetables"?


In German, Gemüse is used as a mass noun. That means it's grammatically singular and takes a singular verb.

Recognizing noun gender


While noun genders might seem random for many words, there are quite a few ways to at least land a likely hit.

For example, many German nouns have some kind of ending, which will always or often come with a particular gender.

Non-living objects that end in -e: these will almost always be feminine (Schokolade, Erdbeere, Orange, Banane, Suppe, …). One of the
very few exceptions is der Käse . This also works for many, but not all animals ( die Katze, Ente, Spinne, Biene, Fliege, … ).

Nouns beginning with Ge- are often neuter. This is the only prefix determining gender. (das Gemüse, …)

There are many more endings like these. You will learn more about them throughout this course.

Fressen vs. essen


Unlike English, German has two similar but different verbs for "to eat": essen and fressen. The latter is the standard way of expressing that an
animal is eating something. Be careful not to use fressen to refer to humans – this would be a serious insult. Assuming you care about
politeness, we will not accept your solutions if you use fressen with human subjects.

The most common way to express that a human being is eating something is the verb essen. It is not wrong to use it for animals as well, so
we will accept both solutions. But we strongly recommend you accustom yourself to the distinction between essen and fressen.

Fortunately, both verbs have the same conjugation:

essen fressen (for animals)

ich esse ich fresse

du isst du frisst

er/sie/es isst er/sie/es frisst

wir essen wir fressen

ihr esst ihr fresst

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essen fressen (for animals)

sie essen sie fressen

German plurals
In English, making plurals out of singular nouns is typically as straightforward as adding an -(e)s at the end of the word:

the dog, the dogs

In German, different nouns have different ways of forming the plural.

Generally, you will probably have to memorize the plurals in the beginning. Later on, your brain will notice regular patterns that are not
easily explained.

However, there are some major regularities that are very helpful to know. If you apply these, the task of mastering German plurals will
become much easier :)

Ending in -(e)n
All nouns ending in -e, and most feminine nouns will add an -(e)n ending in the plural.

die Frau, die Frauen


die Ente, die Enten
der Junge, die Jungen

Ending in -s
Most nouns ending in a full vowel will add an -s in the plural.

das Sofa, die Sofas


das Auto, die Autos
das Baby, die Babys
das Café, die Cafés

This does not apply to nouns ending in -e (which is not a full vowel).

Many of these words are of foreign origin. Some other foreign words will also get the -s plural:

der Chef (the boss), die Chefs


die Email, die Emails
der Job, die Jobs

No ending change
There is no change for neuter or masculine nouns that have any of these singular endings :

-chen, -lein, -el, or -er.

das Mädchen, die Mädchen

der Computer, die Computer


der Löffel (the spoon), die Löffel

Some words for close family members will have an umlaut change:

der Bruder (the brother), die Brüder

If words with these endings are feminine, the plural will end in -n:

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die Schwester (the sister), die Schwestern


die Gabel (the fork), die Gabeln

Ending in -e/-er
Most German one-syllable nouns will add an -e in their plural form. There might be an umlaut change.

das Brot (the bread), die Brote


der Tisch (the table), die Tische
der Ball (the ball), die Bälle

Many other masculine or neuter nouns will need the -er ending, and there may be umlaut changes.

das Kind (the child), die Kinder


der Mann (the man), die Männer

German feminine plurals - nouns ending in -in


Job descriptions are usually masculine:

der Koch (the male cook)


der Fahrer (the male driver)
der Lehrer (the male teacher)
der Arzt (the male physician)

To refer to a female, German adds -in:

die Köchin (the female cook)


die Fahrerin (the female driver)
die Lehrerin (the female teacher)
die Ärztin (the female physician)

As you can see, some of these get an umlaut change. The same umlaut change will happen in the plural.

The plural of the masculine forms usually refers to mixed, as well as all-male groups:

die Köche (the cooks)


die Fahrer (the drivers)
die Lehrer (the teachers)
die Ärzte (the physicians)

If you want to specify that you are talking about a group consisting of women, use the feminine plural forms. These will add -innen in the
plural.

die Köchinnen
die Fahrerinnen
die Lehrerinnen
die Ärztinnen

Predicate adjectives
Predicate adjectives, i.e. adjectives that don't precede a noun, are not inflected.

Der Mann ist groß.


Die Männer sind groß.
Die Frau ist groß.
Die Frauen sind groß.
Das Haus ist groß.
Die Häuser sind groß.

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As you can see, the adjective remains in the base form, regardless of number and gender.

"D'uh", you say? Keep digging into the German skills tree, and you will soon find the deeper reality of German adjectives :)

German Negatives - nicht


There are different ways to negate expressions in German (much like in English you can use "no" in some cases, and "does not" in others).
The German adverb nicht (not) is used very often, but sometimes you need to use kein (not a). Kein will be taught in a later lesson.

Use nicht in the following situations:

Nicht + definite article


Nicht negates a noun that has a definite article:

Das ist nicht der Junge. (That is not the boy.)

Nicht + possessive pronoun


Nicht negates a noun that has a possessive pronoun:

Das ist nicht mein Glas. (That is not my glass.)

Nicht negates a verb


When negating a verb, use nicht.

Ich trinke nicht. (I do not drink.)

Why does the nicht appear at the end here?

Refer to the section "Position of nicht" below to find the answer.

Nicht negates an adverb


Nicht appears before an adverb or adverbial phrase:

Ich tanze nicht oft. (I don't dance often.)

Nicht negates an adjective at the end of a sentence


When an adjective is part of a verb, also use nicht.

Du bist nicht hungrig. (You are not hungry.)

The infinitive here is hungrig sein (to be hungry).

Position of Nicht
Adverbs end up in different places in different languages. You cannot simply place the German adverb nicht where you would put "not" in
English.

The general rule is:

Nicht appears before the item it negates.

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Du bist nicht hungrig. (not hungry)


Ich tanze nicht oft. (not often)
Das ist nicht mein Glas. (not my glass)
Das ist nicht der Junge. (not the boy)

So, what about Ich trinke nicht?

♫ The German Sentence Bracket ♫


Consider this English sentence:

I wake up in China.

The verb would be "wake up", the infinitive "to wake up". English keeps its verb elements close together. German, on the other hand, has a
peculiar sentence structure:

Ich wache in China auf.

The infinitive here is auf|wachen. German will normally put the last element of the infinitive (the part that changes with the person) in
position 2 of the sentence. Everything else will end up at the very end. The rest of the sentence (for example, adverbs), will appear between
this "sentence bracket".

Here's a longer example:

Infinitive: mit Freunden ins Restaurant gehen (to go to the restaurant with friends)

Ich gehe mit Freunden ins Restaurant.

If you're confused now, don't worry :) This will become clearer as you get lots of practice throughout this course.

Why are we telling you this here? This bracket is the reason nicht might end up at the end of a sentence.

Consider these examples:

Ich lerne Deutsch. (I learn German.) — Deutsch lernen (to learn German)
Ich trinke Bier. (I drink beer.) — Bier trinken (to drink beer)
Ich trinke nicht. — nicht trinken ("to not drink")

This skill contains both negative and positive statements.

Yes/No Questions
When asking a yes/no question in English, you would say:

"Is it cold?", but


"Do you have a dog?" or
"Does the man drink water?".

German will not use "do" here. We will switch subject and verb for all verbs.

Ist es kalt?
Hast du einen Hund?
Trinkt der Mann Wasser?

This skill contains both questions and statements.

No continuous aspect
Remember that in German, there's no continuous aspect, i.e. there are no separate forms for "I drink" and "I am drinking". There's only one
form: Ich trinke.

There's no such thing as Ich bin trinke or Ich bin trinken!

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Verb conjugation

Conjugating regular verbs


Here again is the complete table for conjugating regular verbs:

Example: gehen (to go)

English person German example

I ich gehe

you (sg. informal) du gehst

he/she/it er/sie/es geht

we wir gehen

you (pl. informal) ihr geht

they sie gehen

Notice that the 1st and the 3rd person plural have the same ending.

The -h- in gehen tells you that the -e- before it will have a "long" pronunciation. It is not pronounced!

Vowel change in some verbs


A few common verbs change the vowel in the second and third person singular.

Normally the vowel will change:

from a to ä
from e to i(e)

person schlafen sehen

ich schlafe sehe

du schläfst siehst

er/sie/es schläft sieht

wir schlafen sehen

ihr schlaft seht

sie schlafen sehen

Other verbs in this skill are

fahren (to ride) — du fährst


waschen (to wash) — du wäschst

In addition, when a verb stem ends in -s, second and third person plural forms will look the same:

lesen (to read) — du liest, er liest

This is because the -s- from du …-st and the -s from the verb stem merge.

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Wollen and mögen


Wollen (to want) and mögen (to like) follow a different conjugation system:

English pronoun wollen mögen

I want/like ich will mag

you (sg. inf.) du willst magst

he/she/it er/sie/es will mag

we wir wollen mögen

you (pl. inf.) ihr wollt mögt

they sie wollen mögen

Notice that here, the first and third person are the same (plural and singular). The vowel in singular is different from the vowel in plural.

How do you like things in German?


Use the verb mögen to express that you like something or someone.

Mögen cannot be used for verbs!

In a later lesson, you will learn to use the adverb gern(e) to express that you like doing* something .

(The similar verb möchten can be followed by a verb, but Ich möchte Fußball spielen translates as "I would like to play soccer", not "I like
playing soccer".)

Mögen is used for things, animals, and people:


Ich mag Bier. (I like beer.)

Sie mag Katzen. (She likes cats.)

Wir mögen dich. (We like you.)

Ihr mögt Bücher. (You like books.)

Kleider - dresses or clothes?


Das Kleid means "the dress", and die Kleider means "the dresses", but the plural die Kleider can also mean "clothes" or "clothing". In most
cases, "clothing" (or "clothes") translates to Kleidung (usually uncountable), but it's important to be aware that Kleider can be used in that
sense as well.

Hose or Hosen?
Both Hose and Hosen translate to "pants" ("trousers" in British English), but they're not interchangeable. The singular Hose refers to one pair
of pants, and the plural Hosen refers to multiple pairs of pants.

Lakes and seas - false friends ahoy!


The German for "the lake" is der See (masculine) and the most commonly used word for "the sea" is das Meer (neuter).

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There's another slightly less commonly used word for "the sea": die See (feminine).

Be careful not to confuse der See (the lake) and die See (the sea). Remember that when you learn a noun, you should always learn the gender
with it.

singular (masc.: "lake") (fem.: "sea")

nominative der See die See

accusative den See die See

The plural forms are identical (only the plural of der See is commonly used).

plural (masc.: "lakes") (fem.: "seas")

nominative die Seen die Seen

accusative die Seen die Seen

There are not many noun pairs like this in German. Here is the most extreme example, with plural forms:

das Band (die Bänder) - the tape (band)


der Band (die Bände) - the volume/tome
die Band (pronounced as in English) (die Bands) - the music band

Personal Pronouns in the Nominative Case


A pronoun is a word that represents a noun, like er does for der Mann. In the nominative case, the personal pronouns are simply the
grammatical persons you already know: ich, du, er/sie/es, wir, ihr, and sie.

Possessive pronouns
German uses possessive pronouns similar to the English ones. For example "my" is mein in German, "his" is sein, and "her" is ihr.

personal pronouns possessive pronouns

ich mein

du dein

er/es sein

sie (feminine) ihr

wir unser

ihr euer

sie (plural) ihr

Remember that in German, eu sounds like "boy", and the ending -er normally roughly sounds like "ma".

Nominative forms
Unlike English, these possessive pronouns change their endings in the same way as the indefinite article ein.

mein Bruder (ein Bruder)


meine Mutter (eine Mutter)

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This is mostly straightforward (just append the correct ending according to the noun). There is a slight irregularity: euer does not become
euere, but eure (it loses an internal -e-).

The following table has the forms in the nominative case. These are used for subjects, as in

Meine Katze ist super. (My cat is great.)

der Hund das Insekt die Katze die Hunde

indef. article ein ein eine (keine)

ich mein mein meine meine

du dein dein deine deine

er/es sein sein seine seine

sie (fem.) ihr ihr ihre ihre

wir unser unser unsere unsere

ihr euer euer eure eure

sie (plural) ihr ihr ihre ihre

As you might notice, ihr has several different functions, so make sure you understand the context it is used in.

Demonstrative Pronouns
The demonstrative pronouns in English are: this, that, these, and those. In German, in Nominative and Accusative, the demonstrative
pronouns are the same as the definite articles.

That means, der, die and das can also mean "that (one)" or "this (one)" depending on the gender of the respective noun, and "die" (plural)
can mean "these" or "those."

Der ist komisch! (That one is strange!)


Meine Kinder? Die sind in England. (My kids? They/Those are in England.)

When spoken, the definite articles can serve a similar function:

Der Junge liest eine Zeitung, der Junge liest ein Buch.
This boy is reading a newspaper, that boy is reading a book.

The articles would be stressed in that case.

Some other pronouns


Some other words can function as pronouns.

The following ones change their endings like definite articles:

der das

this/these dieser dieses

every jeder jedes

some mancher manches

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die (fem.) die (pl.)

diese diese

jede ---

manche manche

Dieser Junge isst, dieser (Junge) trinkt.


This boy eats, that (boy/one) drinks.

Jedes Kind mag Pizza. (Every kid likes pizza.)

Manche Kinder mögen Käse. (Some kids like cheese.)

Viel vs. viele


These roughly correspond to English "much/many". Use viel with uncountable nouns, viele with countable ones.

Ich trinke viel Wasser.


Ich habe viele Hunde.

Alles oder nichts


Just like nicht (not) has a look-alike nichts (nothing), alle (all) has alles (everything) as a counterpart.

Ich esse nicht. (I do not eat.)


Ich esse nichts. (I eat nothing.)
Ich esse alles. (I eat everything.)
Ich esse alle (Orangen). (I eat all (oranges).)

Ein paar vs. ein Paar


Ein paar (lowercase p) means "a few", "some" or "a couple (of)" (only in the sense of at least two, not exactly two!).

Ein Paar (uppercase P) means "a pair (of)" and is only used for things that typically come in pairs of two, e.g. ein Paar Schuhe (a pair of
shoes).

So this is quite similar to English "a couple" (a pair) vs. "a couple of" (some).

German Negatives
There are different ways to negate expressions in German (much like in English you can use "no" in some cases, and "does not" in others).
The German adverb nicht (not) is used very often, but sometimes you need to use kein (not a).

Nicht
As mentioned in the lesson "Not", you should use nicht in the following situations:

Negating a noun that has a definite article like der Junge (the boy) in Das ist nicht der Junge. (That is not the boy).
Negating a noun that has a possessive pronoun like mein Glas (my glass) in Das ist nicht mein Glas. (That is not my glass).
Negating the verb: Ich trinke nicht. (I do not drink.).
Negating an adverb or adverbial phrase. For instance, Ich tanze nicht oft. (I do not dance often)
Negating an adjective that is used with sein (to be): Ich bin nicht hungrig . (I am not hungry).

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For details, and to learn where to put nicht in a sentence, refer to the "Not" lesson.

Kein
Simply put, kein is composed of k + ein and placed where the indefinite article would be in a sentence. If you want to negate ein, use
kein.

Just like mein and the other possessive pronouns, kein changes its ending like ein.

For instance, look at the positive and negative statement about these two nouns:

Er ist ein Mann. (He is a man) — Sie ist kein Mann. (She is not a/no man.)
Ich habe eine Katze. (I have a cat.) — Ich habe keine Katze. (I have no cat.)

Here are the endings of the indefinite article so far:

masc neut fem plural

nominative ein ein eine ---

accusative einen ein eine ---

Here is the list of the respective kein forms:

masc neut fem plural

nominative kein kein keine keine

accusative keinen kein keine keine

Kein is also used for negating nouns that have no article: Er hat Brot. (He has bread.) versus Er hat kein Brot. (He has no bread.).

As a general rule:

If you can use "not a/no" in English, use kein.


If you need to use "not", use nicht.

Nicht vs. Nichts


Nicht is an adverb and is useful for negations. On the other hand, nichts (nothing/anything) is a pronoun and its meaning is different from
that of nicht.

Ich esse nicht. (I do not eat.)


Ich esse nichts. (I eat nothing.)

Using nicht simply negates a fact, and is less overarching than nichts. For example, Der Schüler lernt nicht. (The student does not learn.) is
less extreme than Der Schüler lernt nichts. (The student does not learn anything.).

Keiner, keine, keines


In German, "nobody" can be expressed in several ways.

As long as at refers to people, niemand works just fine:

Niemand schläft. (Nobody sleeps.)

There is also keiner. It changes endings like the definite articles:

masc. neut. fem. plural

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masc. neut. fem. plural

nominative der das die die

accusative den das die die

masc. neut. fem. plural

nominative keiner keines keine keine

accusative keinen keines keine keine

For now, we teach only the default version (which is masculine in German):

Keiner schläft. (None of them sleeps.)

How do you like things in German?


Use the verb mögen to express that you like something or someone, and use the adverb gern(e) to express that you like doing something.

Mögen is used for things, animals, and people:


Ich mag Bier. (I like beer.)

Sie mag Katzen. (She likes cats.)

Wir mögen dich. (We like you.)

Ihr mögt Bücher. (You like books.)

Please refer to lesson "Present 1" for more details on mögen.

Gern(e) is used for verbs/activities:


Ich trinke gern(e) Bier. (I like to drink beer/I like drinking beer.)

Er spielt gern(e) Fußball. (He likes to play soccer/He likes playing soccer.)

Wir lesen gern(e) Bücher. (We like to read books/We like reading books.)

Sie schreibt gern(e) Briefe. (She likes to write letters/She likes writing letters.)

Position of gerne
If you're not sure where to put gern(e): It goes to the same position as oft (often).

Ich trinke oft Bier. (I drink beer often.)


Ich trinke gern Bier. (I like to drink beer.)

Gern/gerne, allein/alleine
What's the difference between gern and *gerne*? They're just variations of the same word. There's no difference in terms of meaning or
style. You can use whichever you like best.

The same goes for allein(e).

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Position of auch
Auch corresponds to English "also, too".

The positioning follows different rules in both languages. Soon you will learn more about the peculiarities of German sentence structure. For
now, remember that auch takes roughly the same position as nicht. When both occur together, auch will come before nicht.

Consider these two examples to get a first idea about this:

Ich laufe. Du läufst auch. Er läuft nicht. Sie läuft auch nicht .

Ich komme aus China. Du kommst auch aus China. Er kommt nicht aus China. Sie kommt auch nicht aus China.

Here's one more adverb, to see how they work together:

Ich trinke oft Bier. Du trinkst auch oft Bier. Er trinkt nicht oft Bier. Sie trinkt auch nicht oft Bier.

For reasons that will become clearer soon, Sie kommt aus China auch. is not a valid sentence in German.

Recognizing noun gender


As mentioned before, you can often know the gender of a noun by looking at the word ending .

non-living objects that end in -e: these will almost always be feminine ( die Lampe, Schokolade, Erdbeere, Orange, Banane, Suppe, Hose,
Jacke, Sonne, Straße, Brücke, Schule, … )
nouns beginning with Ge- are often neuter. This is the only prefix determining gender. ( das Gebäude, Gemüse, Gesicht, Gesetz, … )

In addition, rhyming can often help. If you already know a noun that rhymes with the new one, there's a good chance they will have the
same gender. Go for it :)

der Fisch, der Tisch


der Raum, der Traum, der Baum
der Kopf, der Knopf

Pronunciation of French loanwords


When English uses a word from French, it usually pronounces it according to English sound rules. German will often sound more close to the
original.

An example for this is Restaurant. Like in French, the last syllable will sound roughly like "raw". The -t will be silent. Some people will
pronounce the ending similar to English "rung" instead. Of course, the R- will sound like the German r, not the English one.

Combining stuff
German is well known for its long words that can be made up on the go by concatenating existing words. In this skill you will learn one very
simple and commonly used way of forming compounds: adding -zeug (="stuff") to existing words.

Remember that the last element determines gender and plural. So all new words in this lesson will be neuter.

OK, because you asked: the longest "real" German word (so far) is:

Rindfleisch-etikettierungs-überwachungs-aufgaben-übertragungs-gesetz

(Without the hyphens. We had to add those in order to be able to show the whole word…)

It's a law on how to transfer tasks about the monitoring of the labeling of beef. At least that's what the word says.

If you enjoyed this, check out "Rhabarberbarbara" on Youtube.

No, words like this don't normally happen in German :)

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How much stuff?


In English, you can't count "stuff" -- you can't use the plural "stuffs" or say that "there are three stuffs on the floor". Instead, "stuff" is a
collective noun, referring to a group of things but used in the singular: "there is stuff on the floor".

Some German -zeug words can work like this as well -- for example, Spielzeug and Werkzeug in the singular, without an article, mean "toys"
and "tools", which are plural in English.

Those words can also be used in a countable way: ein Spielzeug, zwei Werkzeuge "one toy, two tools". So "the tools" could be either das
Werkzeug or die Werkzeuge -- the former would view the tools as a group, the latter would consider them individually.

Look out for whether there is an indefinite article or number before the singular word to see whether it's used countably or uncountably.

If there's a possessive word or a definite article before such a noun in the singular, it could be either: mein Werkzeug ist neu could mean
either "My tool is new" or "My tools are new", for example; similarly with das Werkzeug ist neu which could be either "The tools is new" or
"The tools are new".

(An English word that works similarly is "fruit" -- "my fruit" could refer to just one apple, or it could refer to two apples and a banana all
together, depending on whether "fruit" is used countably or uncountably.)

Other -zeug words are always regular countable words, such as Flugzeug "airplane" or Feuerzeug "lighter".

Pronouns

Personal Pronouns in the Accusative Case


Aside from the nominative case, most of the German pronouns are declined according to case. Like in English, when the subject becomes
the object, the pronoun changes. For instance, ich changes to mich (accusative object) as in Sie sieht mich. (She sees me.).

Nominative (subject) Accusative (object)

ich (I) mich (me)

du (you singular informal) dich (you singular informal)

er (he) sie (she) es (it) ihn (him) sie (her) es (it)

wir (we) uns (us)

ihr (you plural informal) euch (you plural informal)

sie (they) sie (them)

Notice that apart from masculine singular, the third person forms are the same in nominative and accusative. The masculine form, which
does change, has the same endings as the definite article (der becomes den).

Possessive Pronouns in the Accusative Case


You might remember from the lesson "Personal Pronouns" that German possessive pronouns change their endings like the indefinite article:

ein Hund, mein Hund


eine Katze, meine Katze

This extends to all cases. You already know that in the accusative case, only masculine singular changes :

Ein Hund schläft. Er sieht einen Hund.

but:

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Eine Katze schläft. Sie sieht eine Katze. (no change)

So, if you see einen, meinen, unseren and so forth with a singular noun, you will know two things:

the noun is masculine


the noun is in the accusative case (probably the object of the sentence)

Consider this example:

Meinen Hund mag die Frau nicht.

It is clear here that the dog must be the object (accusative). So actually the woman does not like the dog.

Here is the table of possessive pronouns for the accusative case:

Accusative der Hund das Insekt die Katze die Hunde

indef. article einen ein eine (keine)

ich meinen mein meine meine

du deinen dein deine deine

er/es seinen sein seine seine

sie (fem.) ihren ihr ihre ihre

wir unseren unser unsere unsere

ihr euren euer eure eure

sie (plural) ihren ihr ihre ihre

Other declining words

Viel vs. viele


These roughly correspond to English "much/many". Use viel with uncountable nouns, viele with countable ones.

Ich trinke viel Wasser.


Ich habe viele Hunde.

Viele changes endings like the articles. But because the plural forms are the same for nominative and accusative, for now it will look always
the same.

Jeder
Jeder changes endings like definite articles:

die Frau, jede Frau


das Mädchen, jedes Mädchen
der Mann, jeder Mann — den Mann, jeden Mann (accusative)

Möbel
Möbel corresponds to English "furniture". While "furniture" is singular, Möbel is normally only used in the plural.

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Die Möbel sind super! (The furniture is great!)

German Conjunctions
A conjunction like wenn (when) or und (and) connects two parts of a sentence together.

Coordinating conjunctions
Coordinating conjunctions form a group of coordinators (like und (and), aber (but)), which combine two items of equal importance; here,
each clause can stand on its own and the word order does not change.

Ich mag Schokolade. Sie mag Pizza.


Ich mag Schokolade und sie mag Pizza.

Examples: und, oder, aber, denn

Subordinating conjunctions
Subordinating conjunctions combine an independent clause with a dependent clause; the dependent clause cannot stand on its own and
its word order will be different than if it did. In these subordinate clauses, the verb switches from the second position to the last.

Ich bin gesund. Ich laufe oft.


Ich bin gesund, weil ich oft laufe.

Ich spreche gut Deutsch. Ich lerne oft Deutsch.

Ich spreche gut Deutsch, weil ich oft Deutsch lerne.

Examples: weil, wenn, dass, obwohl

Correlative conjunctions
Correlative conjunctions work in pairs to join sentence parts of equal importance. For instance, entweder...oder (either...or) is such a pair and
can be used like this: Der Schuh ist entweder blau oder rot. (This shoe is either blue or red.).

In German, conjunctions do not change with the case (i.e. they are not declinable).

Du trägst einen Rock. Du trägst eine Hose.


Du trägst entweder einen Rock oder eine Hose.

Du wäschst den Rock. Du trägst eine Hose.

Entweder du wäschst den Rock, oder du trägst eine Hose.


Du wäschst entweder den Rock oder (du) trägst eine Hose.

Examples: entweder … oder, nicht nur … sondern auch, weder … noch

Sondern
Sondern works like "but … instead" in English. It only takes the element that is different:

Ich trage kein Kleid. Ich trage eine Hose.


Ich trage kein Kleid, sondern eine Hose.

Sie kommt nicht aus Deutschland. Sie kommt aus China.

Sie kommt nicht aus Deutschland, sondern aus China.

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Leute
In English, you refer to one "person", but multiple "people". In German, Leute is also only used in the plural. The singular is eine Person.

Ich bin Türke. Ich komme aus Berlin.


Germany has many Turkish people. These are not necessarily from Turkey. Most have had their parents or even their grandparents born in
Germany.

Yes/No Questions
Questions can be asked by switching the subject and verb. For instance,

Du verstehst das. (You understand this.)

becomes

Verstehst du das? (Do you understand this?).

These kinds of questions will generally just elicit yes/no answers. In English, the main verb "to be" follows the same principle. "You are
hungry." becomes "Are you hungry?".

In German, all verbs follow this principle. There's no do-support.

Asking a Question in German With a W-Word


There are seven W-questions in German:

English German

what was

who wer

where wo

when wann

how wie

why warum

which welcher

Don't mix up wer and wo, which are "switched" in English :)

Some of these will change according to case.

Was (what)
If you ask was with a preposition, the two normally turn into a new word, according to the following pattern:

English preposition wo-

for what für wofür

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English preposition wo-

about what über worüber

with what mit womit

If the preposition starts with a vowel, there will be an extra -r- to make it easier to pronounce.

This wo- prefix does not mean "where".

Wer (who)
Wer is declinable and needs to adjust to the cases. The adjustment depends on what the question is targeting.

If you ask for the subject of a sentence (i.e. the nominative object), wer (who) remains as is:

Wer ist da? (Who is there?).

If you ask for the direct (accusative) object in a sentence, wer changes to wen (who/whom). As a mnemonic, notice how wen rhymes with den
in den Apfel.

Wen siehst du? — Ich sehe den Hund.


(Whom do you see? — I see the dog.)

You will soon learn about the Dative case. You have to use wem then. And there is a forth case in German (Genitive). You would use wessen
here. This corresponds to English "whose".

The endings look like the endings of der (but don't change with gender/number):

case masc. Form of wer

nominative der wer

accusative den wen

dative dem wem

Welche(r/s) (which)
Welche- words are used to ask about for a specific item out of a group of items, such as "which car is yours?".

This declines not only for case, but also for gender. The endings are the same as for definite articles:

article welch*

der welcher

das welches

die welche

die (pl.) welche

den welchen

Wo (where)

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In German, you can inquire about locations in several ways.

Wo (where) is the general question word, but if you are asking for a direction in which someone or something is moving, you may use
*wohin* (where to).

Consider these examples:

Wo ist mein Schuh? (Where is my shoe?)

Wohin gehst du? (Where are you going (to)?)

Furthermore, wohin is separable into wo + hin:

Wo ist mein Schuh hin? (Where did my shoe go?)

The same goes for woher (where from):

Woher kommst du? (Where are you from)

might become

Wo kommst du her?

English German

where wo

where to wohin

where from woher

Wann (when)
Wann (when) does not change depending on the case. Wann can be used with conjunctions such as seit (since) or bis (till):

Seit wann wartest du? (Since when have you been waiting?)

Bis wann geht der Film? (Till when does the movie last?).

Don't confuse wann with wenn which you learned in Conjunctions. Both translate to "when" in English, but they have different functions in
German.

Wann kommst du? (When are you coming?)

Ich schlafe nicht, wenn ich Musik höre. (I don't sleep when I listen to music)

Warum (why)
Warum (why) is also not declinable. It will never change endings. Wieso, Weshalb, and Weswegen can be used instead of Warum. There's no
difference in meaning.

Here is an example. All four following sentences mean "Why is the car so old?".

Warum ist das Auto so alt?

Wieso ist das Auto so alt?

Weshalb ist das Auto so alt?

Weswegen ist das Auto so alt?

Wie viel vs. wie viele

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Wie viel is used with uncountable or countable nouns (how much/how many), and wie viele is only used with countable nouns (how
many). Some people think that "wie viel" can only be used with uncountable nouns, but that is not true.

Wie viel Milch trinkst du? (How much milk do you drink?)

Wie viel(e) Tiere siehst du? (How many animals do you see?)

Informal and formal words for family members


Just like in English, there are informal and formal words for "mother", "father", "grandmother", and "grandfather". Note that in German, the
difference between formal and informal is a lot more pronounced than in English. The informal terms are pretty much only used within your
own family.

formal informal

die Mutter (the mother) die Mama (the mom)

der Vater (the father) der Papa (the dad)

die Großmutter (the grandmother) die Oma (the grandma)

der Großvater (the grandfather) der Opa (the grandpa)

Family plurals
You might notice that most members of the close family have their own "system" of plurals:

singular plural

die Mutter die Mütter

der Vater die Väter

der Bruder die Brüder

die Tochter die Töchter

die Schwester die Schwestern

Schwester has an extra -n, because it can't change its vowel (e has no umlaut).

Eltern
Eltern (parents) has no singular, unlike in English. We normally refer to Mutter or Vater then.

If necessary, there is a word das Elternteil (literally, "the parents part"). But this is only used in formal settings, for example on forms.

Alternative words for family members


There are countless alternative words for certain family members. A lot of them are regionalisms or influenced by your own family's heritage.
Some of them are ambiguous as well. For instance, some people call their father "papa", and some people call their grandfather "papa".

We can't accept all these terms, and since translations used in the German course for English speakers may also pop up in the English course
for German speakers, we don't want to confuse German speakers with these words. Please understand that we're not going to add more
alternatives. In your own interest, stick to the ones suggested by Duolingo (see above).

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Prepositions
Prepositions take a noun (or a noun phrase):

I talk with a friend from school.

In German, prepositions will change this noun into one of the cases (but never into nominative).

Here, you learn those that always trigger the accusative case.

Remember that as long as the noun is not masculine singular, the nominative and the accusative will look the same.

Der Hund trinkt den Saft. (both are masculine)


Die Katze trinkt die Milch. (both are feminine)

Accusative prepositions
Accusative prepositions always trigger the accusative case.

Nicht ohne meinen Hund! (Not without my dog!)


Die Suppe ist für den Mann ohne Zähne. (The soup is for the man without teeth.)

German has these common accusative prepositions: durch, für, gegen, ohne, um

Entlang
Entlang is a strange word :) It is commonly used with the accusative case. But then it has to appear after the noun.

Ich gehe den Fluss entlang. (I walk along the river.)

It can be used before the noun, but then triggers a different case. This sounds a bit old-fashioned or stilted today. So better use it after the
noun.

German numbers
You might notice that German numbers look very similar to those in English. The two languages are closely related. So any time you
encounter a new word, it's worth checking whether you can find a similar-looking word in English.

At some point, you might realize that there are several more or less consistent changes between English and German. Here are some:

Change English German

t > s/z ten, two zehn, zwei

gh > ch eight acht

v>b seven sieben

th > d/t three drei

o > ei one, two eins, zwei

Generally, the vowels change faster than the consonants. So go for the consonants when looking for related words.

Zahlen, zahlen, zählen


You learned bezahlen (to pay) earlier. There's also the word zahlen, which also means to pay. In this lesson, you learn zählen, which means
"to count". Don't confuse the two.

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In addition, you will see Zahlen. The upper-case initial tells you this is a noun. It is the plural of die Zahl (the number).

Küche vs. Kuchen


Die Küche (the kitchen) and der Kuchen (the cake) are often confused by learners. To German ears, they sound quite different. One reason is
that in Küche, the vowel is short, while the vowel in Kuchen is long.

singular plural

die Küche die Küchen

der Kuchen die Kuchen

Kochen (to cook) also has a short vowel.

Schmecken
Schmecken is very similar to the English word "to taste":

Ich schmecke Knoblauch! (I taste garlic!)


Knoblauch schmeckt super! (Garlic tastes great!)

In addition, schmecken can be used by itself:

Die Pizza schmeckt nicht! (The pizza does not taste good!)

Some popular food

Müsli
Müsli originally refers to "Bircher Müesli", a Swiss breakfast dish, based on rolled oats and fresh or dried fruits.

Nowadays, people will use it for all kinds of cereals or granola, often with high sugar content.

Hähnchen
Hähnchen usually refers to a chicken that has been turned into a dish. While derived from the word for "male chicken" (der Hahn), the only
distinction today is that it is a food item.

Remember that words ending in -chen are always neuter: das Hähnchen.

Salat
Salat can refer to the dish, as well as to the green leaves (usually lettuce) that often go into it.

The Dative Case


Welcome to the third important case in German :) Later on, there will be a last, less important one.

Remember the Accusative ?

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You already saw that the accusative case can be used in different ways.

It can signify the object of a sentence:

Der Hund frisst den Vogel. (The dog is eating the bird.)

This is called the direct object (or accusative object).

It can also be used in combination with some prepositions:

Sie geht ohne den Hund. (She walks without the dog.)
Er hat einen Mantel ohne Knöpfe. (He has a coat without buttons.)

Dative object
The dative case also has a range of different functions.

In this lesson, you learn to use it with the indirect object. This is also called the dative object.

The indirect object in a sentence is the receiver of the direct (accusative) object.

For example, Frau is the indirect (dative) object in

Das Mädchen gibt einer Frau den Apfel. (A girl gives the apple to a woman.)

You can think about it as "the other person involved" in a transaction.

Ich gebe dem Mann einen Apfel. (I give the man an apple.)
Sie zeigt dem Kind den Hund. (She shows the child the dog.)

Generally, the dative object comes before the accusative object.

Dative verbs
The dative is also used for certain dative verbs such as danken (to thank) and antworten (to answer), or helfen (to help):

Ich danke dem Kind. (I thank the child.)


Ich helfe der Frau. (I help the woman.)
Ich antworte meinem Bruder. (I answer my brother.)

These verbs don't have an accusative object.

Dative articles
Note that the dative changes all articles for the words.

For example, die Katze is a feminine noun. However, the article in dative will be der. This might look like the masculine article. But in the
context of a sentence, there will never be any confusion between the two, as long as you know your genders. This is one reason why it's so
important to know the gender of a word.

definite articles Nominative Accusative Dative

masculine der den dem

neuter das das dem

feminine die die der

plural die die den

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indefinite articles Nominative Accusative Dative

masculine ein einen einem

neuter ein ein einem

feminine eine eine einer

plural (keine) (keine) (keinen)

Notice how masculine and neuter look the same in Dative (just like they look the same for Nominative indefinite articles).

This also means that if you see a noun in the Dative, and the article ends in -r, it will be a feminine word. Alternatively, if it ends in -m, it
won't.

It is very much worth remembering these Dative endings, because they will pop up in different context, and help you a lot to sort out the
grammar. In a way, Dative is the "simplest" case :)

Dative endings

Masculine/Neuter -m

Feminine -r

Plural -n

Plural Nouns in Dative


Here's a great rule:

Plural Dative: Everything gets an -n

(Insert Oprah Winfrey GIF here)

You just saw that articles (also pronouns etc.) get an -n ending in dative plural.

Later, you will learn that the German ending system for adjectives is a bit complicated. However, in dative plural, you just add an -n.

It goes so far that even plural forms of nouns get an extra -n in the Dative.

Er hat drei Hunde. Er spielt mit drei Hunden. (He plays with three dogs.)
Die Computer sind alt. Ich antworte den Computern. (I answer the computers.)

There are two "exceptions":

If the plural already end in -n, you're set.


If the plural ends in -s, there's also no change.

Even more -n
Some masculine nouns add an -en or -n ending in the dative and in all other cases besides the nominative . For example in the dative, it
is dem Jungen (the boy).

If you want to look these up, the term for them is "n-Declension".

Euro or Euros?
In German, the singular is Euro and the plural is usually Euro as well. As a rule of thumb, use Euro when talking about a specific amount, e.g.
200 Euro.

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In some contexts, the form Euros is used as well. For instance, you can say Euros to refer to individual euro coins, an unquantified amount of
euros, or euros as opposed to a different currency, e.g.:

Ich habe hundert Schweizer Franken, aber keine Euros (I have a hundred Swiss francs but no euros).

Many native speakers use either plural form regardless of context.

In English, either plural form is perfectly fine. The plural form euro tends to be preferred in the Republic of Ireland, and the plural form euros
tends to preferred pretty much anywhere else. Originally, the plural form euro was supposed to be used in official EU documents, but that's
no longer the case.

Personal Pronouns in the Dative Case


Many words change in the dative case. For the third person pronouns, the following are different from the nominative case: the masculine
pronoun is ihm (to him), the feminine is ihr (to her), the neuter is ihm (to it), and the plural is ihnen (to them).

Nominative Accusative Dative

ich (I) mich (me) mir (to me)

du dich dir

er / es / sie ihn / es / sie ihm / ihm / ihr

wir uns uns

ihr euch euch

sie sie ihnen

Some observations:

In dative, mir, dir, ihr (to me / you / her) rhyme.

In the third person, the endings are the same as for the articles: -m, -r, -n. However, plural dative is "ihnen" (not ihn, as you might
expect).

In the second person plural, accusative and dative pronouns are the same.

Now you can understand why, when thanking a female person, it is only correct to say Ich danke ihr ("I thank her", literally "I give-thank to
her") and not Ich danke sie (that sounds like "I thank she" would sound to an English speaker).

Dative verbs
Remember that some verbs have a dative object. This is just a quirk of German. There was a reason for it when these words were created, but
it's not easy to understand anymore, after a lot of language change.

In short, you just have to learn these :) There aren't very many.

Gehören literally means to "belong to". But don't translate too literally, often a different translation will be more natural.

Wem gehört das Kleid? ("Whose dress is it?" - Literally, "Whom does the dress belong to?")

Tall and short people


Tall people are groß, not hoch, and short people are klein, not kurz.

This is why German people will often refer to tall people as "big" :)

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Cousin, Cousine
These are French words. While it is possible to write Cousine as Kusine now, German never found a way to actually spell Cousin differently.
This is because German originally does not have the French sound at the end. Some people pronounce it like "Kusäng" instead.

Die Frau kennt seinen Onkel - Why not ihren Onkel?


Both Die Frau kennt ihren Onkel and Die Frau kennt seinen Onkel are grammatically correct, but they don't have the same meaning.

When you say Die Frau kennt ihren Onkel, you're either talking about the woman's own uncle, another female person's uncle, or the uncle of
multiple people.

When you say Die Frau kennt seinen Onkel, you're talking about another person's uncle, and that person is male. People can know other
people's relatives.

Dative prepositions
Earlier, you learned that some prepositions always trigger the accusative case.

The most common ones are durch, für, gegen, ohne, um.

In the same way, dative prepositions always trigger the dative case.

Again, here are the common ones: aus, bei, gegenüber, mit, nach, seit, von, zu.

Contractions
Some prepositions and articles can be contracted.

preposition + article contraction

bei + dem beim

von + dem vom

vor + das vors

zu + dem zum

zu + der zur

There are some more, which you will learn later.

Seit
Seit roughly means "since". However, it works a bit differently.

First, it always denotes something that is still going on.

Second, it has three different ways of usage.

Consider these examples:

Ich lerne seit sechs Jahren Englisch. (I'm learning English for six years now.)
Ich lerne seit 2012 Englisch (I've been learning English since 2012.)
Ich lerne Englisch, seit ich denken kann. (I've been learning English since I can think.)

In the first example, seit defines a stretch of time, which reaches into the present.

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In the second example, it also defines a stretch of time, reaching into the present. But it defines this stretch of time by its starting point.

Seit can also be a subordinating conjunction (check the lesson "Conjunctions"). In these, the verb leaves the second position of the sentence,
and ends up at the end. This is why in the last example, ich kann denken (I can think) turns into seit ich denken kann.

Zu Hause vs. nach Hause


Zu Hause means at home, and nach Hause means home (homewards, not at home).

The -e at the end of zu Hause and nach Hause is an archaic dative ending, which is no longer used in modern German, but survived in certain
fixed expressions.

Ich bin zu Hause. (I am at home.)

Ich gehe nach Hause. (I am walking home.)

Hals
Der Hals refers to the whole connection between head and shoulders. German does have more specialized words for "neck" and "throat",
but we normally use Hals for both.

Haare
Das Haar normally refers to a single hair. It can be used to refer to all the hair on someone's head, but is considered slightly outdated or
poetic.

Seine Haare sind lang. (ok)


Sein Haar ist lang. (sounds a bit old)

Bein
Das Bein refers to the leg. It used to mean "bone" a long time ago. This meaning survives in some word combinations:

Elfenbein (ivory, literally "elephant bone")


Eisbein (pork knuckle, literally "ischias bone", because it referred to hip meat before)
Beinhaus (bone house)
Gebein(e) (a collection of bones)

Magen
Der Magen is the stomach, the part of your body that starts digestion. It is not commonly used to refer to the belly (der Bauch).

Brust
Die Brust can have several meanings, depending on context.

Komm an meine Brust! - This means the chest area. It will always be used in the singular.
Vögel haben keine Brüste. (Birds don't have breasts) - This refers to female breasts. It can be used in the singular.

Surprise! There's another way of addressing people. The good news is: it's super easy. Just use the "they" forms when talking to people
you're not close with.

Need more details? Then read on :)

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German You: Who are you talking to?


In English, "you" can be either singular or plural, and no distinction is made between formal and informal. In German, there are three
ways of saying "you".

Du
If you are familiar with someone, you use du (which is called "duzen"). For example, if you talk to your mother, you would say:

"Hast du jetzt Zeit, Mama?" (Do you have time now, Mommy?).

Use this form for family members, co-students, children and young adults.

Ihr
If you refer to more than one person, you use ihr. This is also a "familiar" form, so use it in the same settings as du.

The German ihr you learned earlier is the informal plural of "you," like in

Hans und Karl, habt ihr Zeit? (Hans and Karl, do you have time?)

Sie (formal you)


If you are not familiar with someone or still wish to stay formal and express respect , you use Sie (so-called "siezen"). For example,
you would always address your professor like this:

Haben Sie jetzt Zeit, Herr Schmidt? (Do you have time now, Mr. Schmidt?)

Sie is also used for multiple people. But you can't translate it well with "you all" or "you guys", because that would sound too informal.

Here are the three forms of "you", and "they" for comparison:

English person ending German example

you (singular informal) -st du trinkst

you (plural informal) -t ihr trinkt

you (formal) -en Sie trinken

they -en sie trinken

When spoken, "they" and formal "you" are identical. So, in a way, Germans formally address people like "How are they today?"

How do you know if sie means "she", "they", or "you"?


You can distinguish the formal Sie from the plural sie (they) because the formal Sie will always be capitalized . However, it will remain
ambiguous at the beginning of written sentences.

For instance, Sie sind schön. can either refer to a beautiful individual or a group of beautiful people. The verbs for sie (they) and Sie (you)
are conjugated the same. On Duolingo, either should be accepted unless the context suggests otherwise. In real life, there's always
context. Don't worry about misunderstandings.

Fortunately, the verb for sie (she) is different. Sie ist schön. only translates to "She is beautiful." There's no ambiguity.

Other formal "you"s

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There are more ways to address people formally in German, but they are not in common use and/or outdated, so we don't support
them in this course. You might encounter them in Middle Ages reenactments or so :)

The third person singular was used:

Hat er heute gut geschlafen? (literally, "Has he slept well today?")

The second person plural was also used, and is still used locally:

Ihr habt einen schönen Hut. (literally, "You all have a nice hat.")

You will encounter the informal you in this skill as well


As some of the sentences in this skill are shared among multiple skills, you will encounter the informal you in this skill as well. For
technical reasons, this cannot be changed at this point. Please do not send a report regarding this issue.

Kaufen vs. einkaufen


Kaufen is normally used in the meaning of "to buy":

Ich kaufe einen Hut.

Einkaufen is normally used without an object, and often refers to shopping. It can be used in conjunction with gehen:

Ich kaufe im Supermarkt ein. (I shop in the supermarket)


Wann gehst du einkaufen? (When do you go shopping?)

Verkaufen means "to sell". The prefix ver- is often associated with an "away" notion.

Laden, Geschäft
A variety of words exist for "shop". These are two common ones, with roughly exchangeable usage.

Sehenswürdigkeiten?!
The word Sehenswürdigkeit (sight as in sightseeing) is made up of several meaningful parts: sehen + s + würdig + keit.

Let's look at each part and its meaning.

Part Meaning

sehen to see

-s- connecting element

würdig to be worthy

-keit noun suffix

Literally Sehenswürdigkeit means something which is worthy to see.

The connecting element -s- is used to link words together.

The ending -keit turns an adjective into a noun.

Often the ending of a compound noun is a good indicator for the gender of the noun. For example, if a noun ends in -keit, it will always be
feminine (die).

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Urlaub vs. Ferien


Just like in English there's "holidays" and "vacation", in German there are Ferien and Urlaub. They can be used interchangeably to some
extent.

Ferien only exists as a plural noun:

Die Ferien sind im Sommer. (The holidays are in summer.)

Urlaub only exists as a singular noun:

Wann ist der Urlaub? (When is the vacation?)

Visum
In English, you need "a visa". In German, the singular is das Visum, Visa is the plural (as it is in Latin, the source language of this word).

Weg vs. weg


Der Weg (with a long -e-) roughly means "the path".

Der Weg ist lang. (The path is long.)

The word weg (with a short, open -e-) roughly means "away". Here are some examples:

Geh weg! (Go away!)


Ich bin weg! (I'm gone!)

German numbers
You learned earlier that the numbers from 1-19 are very similar to those in English.

This mostly continues in German, with one important quirk. Did you ever notice that the digits in numbers 13-19 are kind of "switched" in
English? German continues that through to 99.

So 84 would be vier|und|acht|zig (literally, four and eighty).

This might take some getting used to, but at least it's consistent ;)

Hundert
For "100", people would usually just say hundert, not einhundert (as in English).

Huge numbers
There used to be two different systems for huge numbers, called "short scale" and "long scale". Unfortunately, German and American English
ended up with different ones. British English used to use the long scale, but switched to short scale.

Number US English (short scale) German (long scale)

10^6 million Million

10^9 billion Milliarde

10^12 trillion Billion

10^15 quadrillion Billiarde

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Number US English (short scale) German (long scale)

10^18 quintillion Trillion

(10^6 means a one with six zeros)

Adjective endings
When an adjective comes before a noun, its ending will change according to this noun.

Die Katze ist alt.

Das ist eine alte Katze.

Article + Adjective
You can think of the adjective endings as "markers", that kind of mark what part of speech the adjective belongs to.

Nominative
Remember that Nominative is used for the subject of a sentence. These are the nominative adjectives :

gender article adjective noun

masc. der rote Hut

ein roter Hut

neut. das rote Hemd

ein rotes Hemd

fem. die rote Rose

eine rote Rose

Plural die roten Schuhe

keine roten Schuhe

- rote Schuhe

While that might look a bit chaotic, there is not so much going on:

1) Masculine: Either the article, or the adjective must have the -r ending. The same goes for neuter and -s.

Der kleine Hund spielt.


Ein kleiner Hund spielt.

2) Feminine and Plural end in -e. If you add an article, you also have to add an -n.

Die alte Katze schläft.


Alte Katzen schlafen.
Die alten Katzen schlafen.
Das sind keine alten Katzen.

Accusative
Do you remember that quite often, the accusative looks like the nominative? Specifically, only the articles for masculine nouns change.

The same goes for the adjectives. The accusative endings are the same as for Nominative; the only exception is for masculine nouns. The

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changes are marked in bold in the table below.

3) Masculine accusative: adjective ends in -en

Die alte Katze schläft. Der alte Mann sieht die alte Katze (no change)
Die alte Katze sieht den alten Mann.

gender article adjective noun

masc. den roten Hut

einen roten Hut

neut. das rote Hemd

ein rotes Hemd

fem. die rote Rose

eine rote Rose

Plural die roten Schuhe

keine roten Schuhe

- rote Schuhe

Dative
Dative, as always, is even simpler.

4) Dative: all adjectives get an -en ending

Der Hund mit der roten Nase schläft. (The dog with the red nose is sleeping.)

gender article adjective noun

masc. dem roten Hut

einem roten Hut

neut. dem roten Hemd

einem roten Hemd

fem. der roten Rose

einer roten Rose

Plural den roten Schuhen

keinen roten Schuhen

- roten Schuhen

Remember that in dative,

masculine/neuter articles end in -m


feminine articles end in -r
plural articles end in -n
and plural nouns (almost) always end in -n.

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Imperative
The imperative mood is used to express commands, just like in English.

There are three different forms, according to the three types of "you" in German.

Du imperative
The imperative for du is very similar to English:

Du gehst nach Hause. (You go home.)


Geh nach Hause! (Go home!)

For most verbs, to come up with the correct verb form, just lose the -st ending:

Du arbeitest nachts. (You work at night)


Arbeite nachts! (Work at night!)

Du nimmst das Taxi. (You take the taxi.)

Nimm das Taxi! (Take the taxi!)

You might have noticed that some common verbs have an extra umlaut in the 2nd/3rd person singular:

fahren, du fährst
schlafen, du schläfst

In the imperative, these do not have an umlaut:

Du fährst mit dem Taxi.


Fahr mit dem Taxi!

Ihr imperative
The second one is used to address more than one person informally. It uses the same conjugation as the regular ihr form of the present
tense. This form of the imperative does not include a personal pronoun.

Ihr fahrt nach Paris. (You go to Paris.)


Fahrt nach Paris! (Go to Paris!)

Sie imperative
The third one is used to address one or more people formally. It uses the same conjugation as the regular Sie form of the present tense. The
formal imperative is the only form to include the personal pronoun (Sie). Note that the word order is reversed. The verb always precedes the
pronoun. It essentially looks like a question.

Sie lernen Deutsch. (You learn German.)


Lernen Sie Deutsch! (Learn German!)
Lernen Sie Deutsch? (Do you learn German?)

Imperative for sein


The verb sein (to be) is highly irregular. It even has its own imperative version:

normal imperative

du bist sei

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normal imperative

ihr seid seid

Sie sind seien Sie

The following sentences all mean "Please be quiet!":

Sei bitte ruhig! (one friend)


Seid bitte ruhig! (several friends)
Seien Sie bitte ruhig! (some person in the cinema)

Nehmen, du nimmst??
As mentioned before, a small number of common verbs changes the vowel in the second + third person singular.

The change will normally be from a to ä or from e to i(e).

nehmen geben essen lesen lassen

ich nehme gebe esse lese lasse

du nimmst gibst isst liest lässt

er/sie/es nimmt gibt isst liest lässt

wir nehmen geben essen lesen lassen

ihr nehmt gebt esst lest lasst

sie/Sie nehmen geben essen lesen lassen

Student or Schüler?
Ein Student is a university student and a Schüler is a pupil/student at a primary, secondary or high school. Students attending other types
of schools such as language or dancing schools may also be called Schüler.

Dropping articles
When talking about your or someone else's profession in sentences such as I'm a teacher or She's a judge , German speakers usually drop
the indefinite article (ein/eine).

Ich bin Lehrer. (I am a teacher.)

It sounds more natural to say Ich bin Lehrer and Sie ist Richterin than Ich bin ein Lehrer and Sie ist eine Richterin. This rule also applies to
students.

If you add an adjective, you can't drop the article. Er ist ein schlechter Arzt (He's a bad doctor) is correct, but Er ist schlechter Arzt is not.

Also note that you can't drop the definite article (der/die/das).

Male and female variants


The grammatical gender usually matches the biological sex of the person you're referring to.

So the word that refers to a male baker is grammatically masculine, and the word that refers to a female baker is grammatically feminine.

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In the vast majority of cases, the female variant is formed by simply adding the suffix -in to the male variant , e.g. der Bäcker becomes
die Bäckerin and der Schüler (the pupil) becomes die Schülerin.

The plural of the female variant is formed by adding the ending -innen to the singular of the male variant, e.g. die Bäckerinnen and die
Schülerinnen .

Keep in mind that, in some cases, the plural comes with an umlauted stem vowel. This applies to the female variant as well.

singular plural

male der Koch die Köche

female die Köchin die Köchinnen

You learn one more word like this in this lesson:

der Arzt, die Ärztin (the doctor)

Sie ist der Boss!


There are a few words for people where the grammatical and the natural gender differ. One of them is der Boss . There is no feminine version
for it, although there are certainly female bosses.

Mein Boss heißt Linda Ackermann.


Meine Chefin heißt Linda Ackermann.

Prepositions

Accusative prepositions
Accusative prepositions always trigger the accusative case.

Here are the most common ones: durch, für, gegen, ohne, um

Dative prepositions
Dative prepositions always trigger the dative case.

Here are the most common ones: aus, außer, bei, gegenüber, mit, nach, seit, von, zu

Two-way prepositions
Two-way prepositions take the dative case or the accusative case, depending on the context.

This is an unusual, but central part of German grammar.

If there's movement from one place to another, use the accusative case.

Die Katze geht in die Küche. (The cat walks into the kitchen.)

If there's no movement, or if there's movement within a certain place, use the dative case.

Die Katze schläft in der Küche. (The cat sleeps in the kitchen.)
Die Katze geht in der Küche. (The cat walks within the kitchen.)

These prepositions can switch case: an, auf, hinter, in, neben, über, unter, vor, zwischen

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When not to think about location change


Two-way prepositions are very common in everyday speech, so it's a good idea to practice them to fluency.

However, don't forget that for some prepositions, you don't have to decide:

Durch and um will always be accusative, although they might signify an activity without location change:

Das Kind rennt durch den Wald. (The child is running through the forest.)
Die Stühle stehen um den Tisch. (The chairs are standing around the table.)

Aus, von, zu will always be dative, although they might signify a location change.

Er kommt aus der Küche (He comes out of the kitchen.)


Ich fahre zur Arbeit. (I go to work.)
Ich komme von der Arbeit. (I come from work.)

Other uses for two-way prepositions


Some verbs use one of these prepositions in a way that is not about location. This is part of language change, where things get repurposed
all the time.

Über will always trigger the accusative case:

Sie diskutieren über den Krieg. (They discuss the war.)

When used with these verbs, vor will always trigger the Dative:

Er warnt vor dem Hund. (He warns about the dog.)

An, in and auf are more complicated: in some verbs, they trigger the accusative, in others the dative. You'll just have to memorize these.

Er denkt an seinen Bruder. (He thinks of his brother.)


Er arbeitet an einem Film (He's working on a film.)

Ich warte auf den Bus. (I'm waiting for the bus.)

Der Film basiert auf meinem Leben. (The film is based on my life.)

Contractions
Some prepositions and articles can be contracted.

an + das ans

an + dem am

auf + das aufs

bei + dem beim

in + das ins

in + dem im

hinter + das hinters

über + das übers

um + das ums

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an + das ans

unter + das unters

von + dem vom

vor + das vors

zu + dem zum

zu + der zur

Wir gehen ins Kino (We go to the cinema.)

If you would use "that" in English, you would not use a contraction:

In das Kino gehe ich nicht! (I won't go into that cinema!)

Preposition at the end of a sentence??


An important part of German grammar is that some verbs can split off their prefix. This often ends up at the end of a sentence. Some of
these prefixes look exactly like a preposition.

So when you see a "preposition" at the end of a sentence, try to combine it with the verb. You might just have learned a new word :)

Sie macht die Lampe an. (anmachen means "turn on" here)

Ich denke nach. (nachdenken means "to think")

Pass auf dich auf! (aufpassen means "to take care")

Wann fährt der Zug ab? (abfahren means "to depart")

Nimm deinen Hut ab! (abnehmen means "to take off" in this context)

Unfortunately, the way Duolingo is built does not allow to selectively teach German sentence structure. We hope this will change soon :)

Zu Hause vs. nach Hause


Zu Hause means at home, and nach Hause means home (homewards, not at home). The -e at the end of zu Hause and nach Hause is an
archaic dative ending, which is no longer used in modern German, but survives in certain fixed expressions.

Ich bin zu Hause. (I am at home.)

Ich gehe nach Hause. (I am walking home.)

Plastik
Plastik is one of the few words that changes meaning, depending on which gender it is.

das Plastik (artificial material, normally from petroleum)


die Plastik (a word for "sculpture")

Holz, Wald, Forst


In English, "wood" can refer to a material, and to a forest.

In German, Holz only refers to the material. Der Wald is "the forest". We also have a word der Forst, but it only refers to a maintained forest
(something like a garden for trees), where the trees are grown for commercial purposes.

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Ordinal numbers
German ordinal numbers are pretty regular. The general rule is:

number range ending

1-19 -te

> 19 -ste

Irregular forms

1. erste

3. dritte

7. siebte

Ordinal numbers behave like adjectives, so their endings will change accordingly:

Er kennt den ersten Sänger.

Er ist am sechsten August geboren.

Ich bin seine tausendste Lehrerin.

German is simpler than English! (sometimes)


In English, there are two systems for making comparisons:

She is older than him.


Icelandic is more complicated than German.

German only uses the first system:

Sie ist älter als er.


Isländisch ist komplizierter als Deutsch.

This is pretty straightforward. However, quite often, the vowel of short adjectives will get an umlaut change :

normal comparative superlative

alt (old) älter am ältesten

groß (big) größer am größten

oft (often) öfter am öftesten

You might notice that there will be an extra e in the superlative, if the word stem ends in t (or d). This is a general sound rule, just like in ich
arbeite, er arbeitet .

In addition, in some adjectives an e gets lost:

teuer, teurer (not teuerer), am teuersten

Again, this is a general sound rule. You might have noticed it for euer (plural your), which becomes eure, not euere when it gets an ending.

There is a small number of irregular forms:

normal comparative superlative

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normal comparative superlative

gut (good) besser am besten

viel (much) mehr am meisten

gern (to like) lieber am liebsten

hoch (high) höher am höchsten

Comparative adjectives are just adjectives


Consider these examples:

Sie hat eine schöne Uhr.


Sie hat eine schönere Uhr (als ich).

As you can see, comparative adjectives get adjective endings, just like any "normal" adjective.

This can sometimes look a bit confusing:

Er ist mein junger Bruder. (He's my little brother.)


Er ist mein jüngerer Bruder. (He's my younger brother.)

In the second example, the first -er is for the comparative, the second -er is the ending from der Bruder.

If you find that really confusing, why not practice adjective endings a bit? :) You can do so in the earlier lesson "Colors".

Superlative
Please refer to the lesson "Comparisons" for a table of comparative and superlative forms, especially how to form the irregular forms.

Superlative as an adverb
In the last lesson, you learned the comparative:

Der Hund ist alt. Die Katze ist älter.

As in English, there is also a superlative:

Der Papagei ist am ältesten. (The parrot is the oldest.)

Sie rennt am schnellsten. (She runs the fastest.)

Am ältesten works like an adverb (How is he? - the oldest; How does she run? the fastest). That means its endings will never change.

Superlative as an adjective
Like in English, you can also use superlatives as adjectives.

Remember that adjectives change their endings according to the noun, if they come before the noun:

Er ist der älteste Hund. (He is the oldest dog.)


Wir haben den ältesten Hund.

Now, consider these two sentences:

Mein Hund ist der älteste. (imagine a second "Hund" at the end)
Mein Hund ist am ältesten.

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Both translate to "My dog is the oldest", and both are possible in German. The last one is more common though, and we recommend you
only use this one for now.

On the other hand, you cannot say:

Er der am ältesten Hund. (This is wrong!!)

This is because you can't put an adverb in front of a noun. That's what adjectives are for.

Don't forget that with adjectives, you have to use the right ending to match with the noun:

Das ist die kleinste Katze der Welt! (This is the world's smallest cat!)
Wir geben der schönsten Katze einen Preis. (We give a prize to the most beautiful cat.)

As a rough guideline, use a form like die älteste, den ältesten, … before a noun, and am ältesten at the end of a sentence.

Ganz

As an adjective: easy
The word "ganz" has several functions in German. As an adjective, it means "whole":

Ich esse den ganzen Apfel. (I eat the whole apple.)

As an adverb: tricky!
As as adverb, it can intensify or de-intensify other words (depending on which other word you use).

Here's a table to get an idea of the problem:

Intensifier De-Intensifer

schlecht gut

oben nett

vorne sympathisch

früh schön

sicher interessant

toll gern

furchtbar lustig

… ok

Consider these examples:

Der Film war ganz gut. (The film was quite nice.)
Der Film war ganz toll! (The film was really great!)

You see the problem :) Ganz is tricky to use for beginners. For now, better use these two words instead :

ziemlich (always means "quite")


total (always means "really")

Der Film war total gut. (The film was really nice.)

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Der Film war ziemlich toll. (The film was quite great.)

Das Handtuch (the towel) vs. das Tuch (the cloth)


A Handtuch is a towel, not a hand towel. Of course, a towel can be a hand towel, but this does not mean that the two words are
interchangeable. A pet can be a dog, but this does not mean that the words "pet" and "dog" are interchangeable.

Days of the week


Earlier, the weekday started with Sunday:

English German

Sunday Sonntag (sun)

Monday Montag (moon)

Tuesday Dienstag (god "Tyr"?)

Wednesday Mittwoch (middle of week)

Thursday (Thor!) Donnerstag (thunder)

Friday Freitag (goddess Freya)

Saturday (Saturn) Samstag (sabbath)

However, we changed to Monday as the start of the week, which makes Mittwoch sound a bit silly now :)

Am, im, um
If you want to say "on Monday" and so on, that would be am Montag.

Here's a mnemonic to remember when to use which:

am Montag
um drei Uhr
im Juni

Location

Hier, da, dort


When talking about locations in English, you can use here, there, this, and that to express that something is close or far away. In German the
word da is commonly used when talking about locations. The good thing about da is, you don't have to worry about the distance! It can
mean anything close or far away.

Let's look at a few examples:

Wir sind da. (We are here/there.)


Da ist ein Apfel. (Here/There is an apple.)

With hier (here) and dort (there) you can be more specific about the distance.

hier (here)

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da (here/there)
dort (there)

You can also say da oben for "up there" and so on:

Die Katze ist da oben. (The cat is up there.)


Da hinten wohnt er. (He lives there in the back.)

Das hier
You can combine all of them with articles, and use them similar to this and that !

das hier (this)


das da (this/that)
das dort (that)

Many people use this with the other articles as well. Note that while all of the following constructs are commonly used in spoken language,
they are not appropriate for written, formal language.

der/die/das hier (this)


der/die/das da (this/that)
der/die/das dort (that)

To refer to one specific thing, you can put a noun between the article and hier/da/dort.

For example:

Der Apfel da ist groß. (That apple is big.)


Die Katzen da sind süß. (Those cats are cute.)

Some people might add drüben. This translates to over there.

Der Apfel da drüben ist groß. (That apple over there is big.)
Die Katzen dort drüben sind süß. (Those cats over there are cute.)

Innen, drinnen
Innen and außen mostly refer to the inside and outside of objects.

Drinnen and draußen are normally only used for rooms (more generally, enclosed spaces that people can be in).

Die Wassermelone ist innen rot und außen grün. (The watermelon is red on the inside, and green on the outside.)
Drinnen ist es trocken, aber draußen regnet es. (Inside, it is dry, but outside it is raining.)

Common adjective endings

-ig, -lich, -isch


Here are three common endings, which sound very similar:

-ig (roughly like -y in English): eindeutig, abhängig, …


-lich (roughly -ly in English): nützlich, möglich, persönlich, …
-isch (roughly -ic(al) in English): praktisch, logisch, …

The first two sound the same in regular speech (in some dialects, all three sound the same). You already encountered this with the numbers
(zwanzig).

When you add an ending to the -ig adjectives, it will no longer sound like ch:

eindeutig: die eindeutige … (now sounds like g)

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möglich: der mögliche … (still sounds like ch)

-bar
-bar often corresponds to "-(a)ble" in English:

sichtbar (visible)
verfügbar (available)

Yes, there are lots of bars with joke adjective names in Germany :)

-los, -voll
These correspond to English "-less" and "-ful".

hoffnungsvoll (hopeful)
hoffnungslos (hopeless)

-tion
In English, the "-tion" ending is pronounced "-shen". In German, it always becomes "-tsion". It will always be the emphasized syllable, and
the word will always be feminine.

Kommunikation, Lektion, Nation

Similarly, der Patient will sound like "der Patsient".

When nouns ending in -tion are used in an adjective, the ending -a (or -ell) will be used. The resulting adjective will be pronounced on the
last syllable:

international, rational, kommunal, sensationell, …

Bundesland
Germany is a Federal Republic (Bundesrepublik). It consists of 16 federal states, which have some degree of autonomy. These are called
Bundesländer.

Pension
Die Pension has different meanings, depending on context. Here it means "guest house". It can also mean "retirement pay".

What is a Pflaster?
Das Pflaster is a small adhesive bandage.

Depending on where you live, you may call it "Band-Aid", "plaster" or "Elastoplast" in English.

The German word Pflaster does not refer to a plaster cast. The German for plaster cast is der Gips(verband).

Wissen vs. kennen


Wissen and kennen both translate to "to know" in English. Können (to be able to) can also mean "to know" in certain contexts.

Ich weiß (es) nicht. (I don't know.)

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Ich kenne ihn nicht. (I don't know him.)


Ich kann ein bisschen Polnisch. (I know a bit of Polish.)

So how to know which one to use?

Kennen
Kennen is used when talking about people, places and the like. It means that you are aware of its existence. Kennen needs an object.

Ich kenne diesen Mann nicht! (I don't know this man!)

Wissen
Wissen is used for knowledge about something. It usually does not have an object. Commonly, it is used with a subordinate clause
("Nebensatz"):

Ich weiß, wer du bist! (I know who you are.)


Ich weiß nicht, wann sie kommt. (I don't know when she arrives.)
Er weiß, dass ich ihn liebe. (He knows that I love him.)

In rare cases, wissen can be used with an object, which might lead to very subtle situations like this:

Ich kenne dieses Wort nicht (I don't know this word.)


Ich weiß dieses Wort nicht. (I don't know this word.)

In the first example, you have never seen this word before. In the second example, you have seen it, but you don't know what it means.

Können
Können generally means "be able to", and is generally used like "can/be able to" in English. The only confusing thing is that it can take a
language instead of an infinitive, which English cannot:

Ich kann tanzen (I can dance.)


Ich kann Deutsch (I can speak German.)

Conjugation of wissen
We already used a range of verbs that change the vowel in the second and third person singular :

person fahren lesen essen

ich fahre lese esse

du fährst liest isst

er/sie/es fährt liest isst

wir fahren lesen essen

ihr fahrt lest esst

sie/Sie fahren lesen essen

You also encountered modal verbs which generally have a different vowel in singular and plural, respectively. They also have a simpler (and
the same) ending in the first and second person singular.

Wissen (to know) is a full verb. However, it is one of the very few full verbs that conjugates like a modal verb:

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pronoun wollen mögen wissen

ich will mag weiß

du willst magst weißt

er/sie/es will mag weiß

wir wollen mögen wissen

ihr wollt mögt wisst

sie wollen mögen wissen

Non-stressed prefixes
You already noticed that in German, some verb prefixes can split off:

ankommen — Ich komme an.


einkaufen — Er kauft ein.

The general rule is: if the prefix is stressed, it splits off.

How to know which ones are stressed?

It might be easiest to remember those that are never stressed. The most important ones are:

be-, ent-, er-, ver-, zer-

If you encounter a different prefix, guessing that it splits off will most likely be correct.

Gefallen
So far, you have learned two ways to say "I like".

Mögen is used with nouns:

Ich mag Schokolade! (I like chocolate!)

Gern(e) is an adverb that modifies a verb:

Ich esse gerne Schokolade. (I like to eat chocolate.)


Ich lerne gerne Deutsch. (I like to learn German.)
Ich kaufe gerne ein. (I like to go shopping.)

In this lesson, you learn a third way: gefallen.

Er gefällt mir. (I like him.)

What's going on?! Literally, it means "He is-pleasing to me." That's why "him" become the subject, and "I" becomes the Dative object in the
example above.

Gefallen is normally used if you like the look, sound or feel of something:

Die Songs gefallen mir. (I like the songs.)


Das Haus gefällt uns. (We like the house.)

Like mögen, you would only use it with nouns (not with verbs).

Legen vs. liegen

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Earlier, you learned the verb legen:

Ich lege den Ball auf den Tisch. (I put the ball on(to) the table.)

Liegen is related, but defines a position:

Der Ball liegt auf dem Tisch (The ball is on the table.)

Legen roughly corresponds to "lay", liegen to "lie".

Monatlich
Just as in English you have "year/yearly", German has the same word pairs. In German, some of these have an umlaut change:

noun adjective

das Jahr jährlich

der Monat monatlich

der Tag täglich

die Stunde stündlich

die Minute minütlich

die Sekunde sekündlich

Why does monatlich not change? All others are emphasized on the syllable that changes. Monatlich is emphasized on the first syllable.

Seasons
The seasons in German are as follows:

English German

spring der Frühling

summer der Sommer

autumn der Herbst

winter der Winter

Herbst sounds similar to "harvest", and Frühling has früh (early) in it.

When you refer to seasons or months, you use im. Here's the mnemonic again that helps you remind which is which:

am Montag
um drei Uhr
im Juni

Verein
Der Verein (the r is silent) is something between a club and a society. It is very common in Germany: There are almost 600,000 eingetragene
Vereine (publicly registered associations) in Germany. They bear the abbreviation e.V..

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A Verein might help the homeless, offer tennis lessons, dance together, among many other activities.

Man
In English, you can say "you can say" or "one can say". In German, man is commonly used for this purpose. It does not imply that only male
people are included, think of it like the English "man" as in "mankind".

Grammatically, it works exactly like er:

Er schläft nicht auf der Küche. (He does not sleep in the kitchen)
Man schläft nicht in der Küche! (One does not sleep in the kitchen!)

Ein paar vs. ein Paar


Ein paar (lowercase p) means a few, some or a couple (of) (only in the sense of at least two, not exactly two!).

Ein Paar (uppercase P) means a pair (of) and is only used for things that typically come in pairs of two, e.g. ein Paar Schuhe (a pair of shoes).

So this is quite similar to English "a couple" (a pair) vs. "a couple of" (some).

Werden + Infinitiv = Futur


German normally uses the present tense to indicate the future.

Ich gehe morgen ins Kino. (I will go to the movies tomorrow.)

On some occasions (for example when making promises or predictions), German does use a future tense. It is very similar to the one in
English.

The future tense consists of a conjugated form of werden in the present tense and an infinitive (the base form of the verb).

German English

ich werde spielen I will play

du wirst spielen you will play

er/sie/es wird spielen he/she/it will play

wir werden spielen we will play

ihr werdet spielen you will play

sie/Sie werden spielen they/you will play

Depending on the context, ich werde spielen translates to "I will play" or "I am going to play". In German, there is no distinction between
"will" and "going to".

Be aware that the German verb wollen (to want) is a false friend of the English will :

Ich will spielen! (I want to play!)

Werden has three different functions


Using werden can be confusing for learners. However, there are clear distinctions between its three main uses :

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Werden + adjective/noun = "to become"


If werden is used in combination with an adjective or noun, the meaning will be "to become" or "to get":

Sie wird Mutter. (She's becoming a mother.)


Ich werde müde. (I'm getting tired.)

The German word bekommen is a confusing false friend to "become":

Sie bekommt eine Tochter. (She's getting a daughter.)

Werden + Infinitiv = Futur


This case is explained above.

Werden + past participle = passive


If used in combination with a participle, werden creates one type of passive:

Der Taxifahrer fährt den Fahrgast. (The taxi driver drives the passenger.)
Der Fahrgast wird gefahren. (The passenger is being driven.)

Long and short vowels

Which sounds are there?


In German, every vowel can be long or short. The short one often sounds more open than the long one.

The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is given for the geeks among you :) But you can also copy/paste one of these symbols into
Wikipedia to get an in-depth explanation of it (with sound!).

vowel short IPA long IPA

a Mann /a/ Bahn /aː/

ä Bälle /ɛ/ Käse /ɛː/

e rennen /ɛ/ Beere /eː/

i Mitte /ɪ/ ziehen /iː/

o oft /ɔ/ ohne /oː/

ö Hölle /œ/ schön /øː/

u Mutter /ʊ/ Buch /uː/

ü Müll /ʏ/ Bücher /yː/

You can also google "german sounds" for a longer introduction to German sounds.

When is a vowel short or long?


German has a range of spelling convention which will clearly show whether a vowel is short or long:

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A vowel before a double consonant will be short:

Mann, denn, Mutter, Bälle, backen, Pizza, Katze

Note that instead of "zz" (which only occurs in the Italian "Pizza"), German uses tz. Instead of "kk", we use ck.

There are also some signals that clearly show the vowel is long.

Sometimes, the vowel will be doubled:

paar, Beere, Boot, … (this only happens with a/e/o)

There might be a silent h behind the vowel:

fahren, zählen, sehen, ihr, ohne, höher, Uhr, Stühle, …

Note that if you read the list above, you should not hear a single h sound. It is geh|en, not ge|hen.

For i, it is more common to have an -e after it (sometimes even -eh):

die, Biene, spielen, sieben, Beziehung, …

Again, the h will be silent: Be|zieh|ung, not Be|zie|hung.

But sometimes, there will not be a signal.

The following examples have an unmarked long vowel:

Buch, da, Abend, wo, Not, Zitrone, …

And here are some short ones:

an, Onkel, un-, Mama, Hälfte, Zitrone, …

For these, you just have to trust your language feeling, it will normally not be a big problem :)

Times of day
German uses a system similar to English:

English German

morning der Morgen am Morgen

- der Vormittag am Vormittag

noon der Mittag am Mittag

afternoon der Nachmittag am Nachmittag

evening der Abend am Abend

night die Nacht in der Nacht

midnight die Mitternacht um Mitternacht

It's generally pretty straightforward. Remember this mnemonic:

am Montag
um drei Uhr
im Juni

Am Montag, am Mittag. Just "at night there are different rules": in der Nacht and um Mitternacht are irregular.

All of these have and adverbial form: morgens, vormittags, abends, nachts*, …

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Morgen am Morgen?
Similar to Spanish, the words for "tomorrow" and "morning" are the same in German. Unlike Spanish, German escapes this problem by
choosing a different word when they clash.

Instead of morgen am Morgen or morgen morgens we say morgen früh.

Telling the time

Official time
In German, there are "official" and informal ways to say the time. Here's the official one (often used on radio and television):

dreizehn Uhr neun (literally, "thirteen o'clock nine")

Official time uses a 24 hour system, from zero to 24.

Don't confuse "hour" and Uhr (they are false friends):

English German

the hour die Stunde

o'clock Uhr

Die Uhr can also mean "clock" or "watch". Die Stunde can also mean "lesson" (which confusingly might not last one hour).

Informal time
In everyday life, people will often use informal time.

There are several systems, with two forms dominant. In many parts of Germany, this system is used:

Time English German

14:05 five past two fünf nach zwei

14:10 ten past two zehn nach zwei

14:15 a quarter past two viertel nach zwei

14:20 twenty past two zwanzig nach zwei

14:25 twenty-five past two fünf vor halb drei

14:30 half past two halb drei

14:35 thirty-five past two fünf nach halb drei

14:40 twenty to three zwanzig vor drei

14:45 a quarter to three viertel vor drei

14:50 ten to three zehn vor drei

14:55 five to three fünf vor drei

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Yes, the part in the middle is very confusing :) German considers the next hour to be half full. In addition, German relates "X:25" and "X:35" to
the half hour.

Ob
Indirect questions are subordinate clauses in German:

Was machst du? (direct question, verb in position 2)


Ich weiß, was du machst! ("I know what you do!", verb at the end)

For questions with a question word, the question word starts the sentece, and the verb ends it.

For yes/no-questions, German uses ob as a placeholder (just like "whether" is used in English):

Gehst du ins Kino?


Er fragt, ob du ins Kino gehst.

Je … desto …
Je … desto … works roughly like "the … the …" in English:

The longer I learn German, the happier I become.


Je länger ich Deutsch lerne, desto glücklicher werde ich.

However, the sentence structure is unusual, when compared to English. For the above sentence, it is:

je + (comparison) (subject) (rest) (verb), desto (comparison) (verb) (subject) (rest)

The je part is a subordinate clause, so the verb will be at the end. Because the je+comparison is in the first position, the subject has to come
immediately after, followed by the rest of the sentence.

The desto part is a main clause. The verb is in position 2, and desto+comparison are in the first position. This is not unusual in German, as
you can put all kinds of elements in the first position:

| Position 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | |---|---|---|---|---] | Ich |esse |morgen |mit einem Freund |zu Mittag.| |Morgen |esse |ich |mit einem Freund |zu Mittag.|
|Mit einem Freund |esse |ich |morgen |zu Mittag.| |Zu Mittag |esse |ich |morgen |mit einem Freund.|

Notice how the verb is always in the second position. The subject is either at the beginning (the default), or directly behind the verb.

Mal
(-)mal can often be translated with "time(s)" in English:

German English

zehn mal ten times

manchmal sometimes

das erste Mal the first time

In addition, it has a function as a "modal particle". These are words that give a sentence an additional flavor, and can't be easily translated.
Modal particles are almost never emphasized.

Komm mal nach Hause! (I'm impatient, come home!)


Kann ich mal vorbei? (Can I get through? I won't bother you for long.)

We don't teach modal particles in this course (because you can't translate them). But you will encounter mal schauen in this lesson, which
roughly means "let's see".

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Modal verbs

Verb forms
You already learned some modal verbs:

pronoun wollen mögen können

ich will mag kann

du willst magst kannst

er/sie/es will mag kann

wir wollen mögen können

ihr wollt mögt könnt

sie wollen mögen können

Modal verbs are the same in the first and third person singular.

They also often change their vowel. The vowel in the singular will be different from the vowel of the infinitive.

Forms of müssen, sollen, wollen, dürfen, möchten


In this lesson, you will learn the remaining five modal verbs.

Consider these three:

pronoun müssen dürfen wollen

ich muss darf will

du musst darfst willst

er/sie/es muss darf will

wir müssen dürfen wollen

ihr müsst dürft wollt

sie müssen dürfen wollen

As in können und wollen, the vowel in the singular is different. The first and third person are the same in the plural and in the singular (unlike
normal verbs).

Here are the last two:

pronoun sollen möchten

ich soll möchte

du sollst möchtest

er/sie/es soll möchte

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pronoun sollen möchten

wir sollen möchten

ihr sollt möchtet

sie sollen möchte

sollen does not change its vowel. Otherwise it works roughly like "shall".

möchten is unusual. It is actually the subjunctive form of "mögen", which is why it has the same ending system as subjunctive and past
tense verbs. You will learn about those later in the course.

If you remember that mögen translates to "like" in English, it makes perfect sense that its subjunctive möchten means "would like to".

Ich mag Pizza. (I like Pizza.)


Ich möchte Pizza. (I would like (to eat) Pizza.)

How to use modal verbs


As in English, modal verbs are combined with the infinitive of a verb:

Ich schwimme. Ich kann schwimmen. (I swim. I can swim.)

Because of the peculiarity of German sentence structure, the infinitive verb will appear at the end in a normal sentence:

Ich muss jeden Tag arbeiten. (I have to work every day.)

Müssen vs. dürfen


A common problem for English speakers learning German is to use müssen right. Here's the problem:

Ich muss schlafen. (I must sleep.)


Ich muss nicht schlafen. (I don't need to sleep.)

Actually, the problem is in English. Let's look at the same example again, but use "have to" instead:

Ich muss schlafen. (I have to sleep.)


Ich muss nicht schlafen. (I don't have to to sleep.)

As you can see, if you think "have to" instead of "must", you'll be fine.

But how to say "must not"?

Ich darf nicht schlafen. (I must not sleep.)


Ich darf schlafen. (I'm allowed to sleep.)

As you can see, dürfen works pretty much like "may" in English.

Darf ich? (May I?)


Nein, du darfst nicht. (No, you may not.)
Oh, schade.

Damit vs. damit


There are two words spelled damit in German.

One is a combination of a pronoun and a preposition (da+mit). It means "with that" .

Das ist ein Stift. Damit schreibe ich. (That's a pen. With that, I write.)
Ich habe ein Deutschzertifikat. Damit kann ich in Deutschland studieren. (I have a German certificate. With that, I can study in

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Germany.)

This word is generally emphasized on the first syllable. As any standard sentence element, If it is used in the first position, the subject will
have to go after the verb (with has to be in position 2).

The other is a subordinating conjunction. It translates to "so that":

Ich kaufe einen Stift, damit ich schreiben kann. (I buy a pen so that I can write.)
Ich lerne Deutsch, damit ich in Deutschland studieren kann. (I learn German so that I can study in Germany.)

Because it creates a subordinate clause, the verb of that clause has to go to the end. This version of damit is pronounced at the second
syllable.

To remember which is which, remember that the one that's emphasized at the end also sends the verb to the end.

Damit, um … zu …, zum …
There are at least three ways to express a goal.

Zum
The easiest just takes a simple verb:

Ich fahre zum Skifahren nach Japan. (I go to Japan for skiing.)


Zum Lachen geht er in den Keller. (He goes to the basement to laugh.)

The verb becomes a noun here, hence the upper-case initial, and the zum (zu+dem) preposition. If a verb turns into a noun, it always gets
neuter gender (das Essen, das Lachen).

Um … zu …
If you have a more complicated verb complex (for example, with adverbs or objects), you cannot use zum. Use um … zu … instead:

Ich gehe ins Restaurant, um mit Freunden Pizza zu essen. (I go to the restaurant in order to eat pizza with friends.)

To do this, you start with an infinitive construction:

mit Freunden im Supermarkt einkaufen (to go shopping in the supermarket with friends)

If you were to use this in a sentence, it would look like this:

Ich kaufe mit Freunden im Supermarkt ein.

The um goes to the beginning of the infinitive construction. The zu goes were the verb part (in the above example, kaufen splits off.

Ich fahre in die Stadt, um mit Freunden im Supermarkt einzukaufen.

Damit
If your main sentence has a different subject than your goal, you can't use an infinitive. Use damit, which comes with a subordinate clause.

Ich gebe ihm mein Handy, damit er seine Mutter anrufen kann. (I give him my phone so that he can call his mom)

Read the section "damit vs. damit" for more information on how to use it.

Womit? Damit!
Many prepositions can be combined with wo- and da-. da roughly translates to "that" here, wo normally to "what" (not "where" which is its
normal meaning).

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wo- da-

woran daran

worauf darauf

woraus daraus

wobei dabei

wodurch dadurch

wofür dafür

wogegen dagegen

wohinter dahinter

worin darin

womit damit

wonach danach

worum darum

worüber darüber

worunter darunter

wovon davon

wovor davor

wozu dazu

wozwischen dazwischen

If the preposition starts with a vowel, there will be a binding r. So worum is pronounced wo-rum (not wor-um).

Der See vs. die See


Der See means "the lake". Die See means "the sea, the ocean". It is less commonly used. German uses more often das Meer or der Ozean for
the latter.

Check out Bodensee and Nordsee on Google Maps and see if you can figure out which one is feminine and which one is masculine :)

Der Strand
Der Strand means "the beach". This meaning still survives in the English adjective "stranded" (literally, ended up on a lonely beach).

Holz, Wald, Forst


In English, "wood" can refer to a material, and to a forest.

In German, Holz only refers to the material. Der Wald is "the forest". We also have a word Der Forst, but it only refers to a maintained forest

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(something like a garden for trees), where the trees are grown for commercial purposes.

The genitive case


The genitive case is used to indicate possession.

Das Fahrrad des Mannes ist schwarz. (The man's bike is black.)

Das Fahrrad des Kindes ist blau. (The kid's bike is blue.)

Das Fahrrad der Frau ist grün. (The woman's bike is green.)

Das Fahrrad der Männer/der Kinder/der Frauen ist rot. (The people's bike is red.)

masc. neut. fem. plural

nom. der das die die

acc. den das die die

dat. dem dem der den

gen. des des der der

Das Fahrrad eines Mannes ist schwarz.

Das Fahrrad eines Kindes ist blau.

Das Fahrrad einer Frau ist grün.

masculine neuter feminine

nominative ein ein eine

accusative einen ein eine

dative einem einem einer

genitive eines eines einer

Nouns
Nouns consisting of one syllable tend to add -es in the masculine and neuter. The ending is often reduced to just -s, especially in
colloquial speech.

der Hund, des Hundes

Nouns consisting of more than one syllable, tend to add just -s.

der Computer, des Computers

Weak nouns add -n or -en in the genitive as well (all cases but the nominative), e.g. des Jungen and des Studenten. Check the lesson
"Dative Case" for a discussion of these nouns.

Genitive phrases have a fixed word order


You can say das Fahrrad des Kindes, but you cannot say des Kindes Fahrrad. The latter word order used to be acceptable hundreds of
years ago, and you may still occasionally find it in poetry, but it’s no longer used in contemporary Standard German.

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Proper names
In contrast to common nouns, proper names precede the noun.

Peters Fahrrad ist neu.

Do not add an apostrophe unless the name already ends in -s or -z. In the latter case, the apostrophe comes at the very end of the
name.

Hans’ Fahrrad ist alt.

Adjectives
Adjectives in the genitive case end in -en. The only exception are feminine and plural, without article (feminine without article is
quite rare).

preceded by an article not preceded by an article

masculine das Fahrrad des/eines großen Mannes wegen großen Bedarfs

feminine das Fahrrad der/einer kleinen Frau trotz großer Freude

neuter das Fahrrad des/eines kleinen Kindes trotz ruhigen Wesens

plural (any gender) das Fahrrad der kleinen Kinder wegen neuer Informationen

Prepositions that take the genitive case


The most common prepositions that take the genitive case are:

German English

anstatt instead of

statt instead of

aufgrund because of

trotz despite

während during

wegen because of

In colloquial speech, some prepositions that traditionally take the genitive tend to take the dative nowadays.

Trotz des Regens geht spielt er Fußball. (Genitive)


Trotz dem Regen spielt er Fußball. (Dative)

Verbs that take the genitive case


There’s a small set of verbs that take the genitive. Most of them are not used a lot in everyday speech and they may sound a bit stilted.

The dative as an alternative

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As an alternative for the genitive, you can often use von followed by the dative case . Here are some examples:

genitive dative

der Ball der Frau der Ball von der Frau

der Ball des Mädchens der Ball von dem Mädchen

der Ball des Mannes der Ball von dem Mann

der Ball der Kinder der Ball von den Kindern

Peters Ball der Ball von Peter

Often, the genitive case will be preferred in written language, with colloquial language going more for the dative case.

Student or Schüler?
A Student is a university student and a Schüler is a pupil/student at a primary, secondary or high school. Students attending other types of
schools such as language or dancing schools may also be called Schüler.

Dropping articles
When talking about your or someone else's profession in sentences such as I'm a teacher or She's a judge , German speakers usually drop
the indefinite article (ein/eine). It sounds more natural to say Ich bin Lehrer and Sie ist Richterin than Ich bin ein Lehrer and Sie ist eine
Richterin. This rule also applies to students.

If you add an adjective, you can't drop the article. Er ist ein schlechter Arzt (He's a bad doctor) is correct, but Er ist schlechter Arzt is not.

Also note that you can't drop the definite article (der/die/das).

Male and female variants


The grammatical gender usually matches the biological sex of the person you're referring to, i.e. the word that refers to a male baker is
grammatically masculine, and the word that refers to a female baker is grammatically feminine. In the vast majority of cases, the female
variant is formed by simply adding the suffix -in to the male variant , e.g. der Bäcker becomes die Bäckerin and der Schüler (the pupil)
becomes die Schülerin.

The plural of the female variant is formed by adding the suffing -innen to the singular of the male variant, e.g. die Bäckerinnen and die
Schülerinnen.

Keep in mind that, in some cases, the plural comes with an umlauted stem vowel. This applies to the female variant as well, e.g. der Koch
becomes die Köche and die Köchin becomes die Köchinnen.

When is the Perfekt used?


The Perfekt is used to describe past events. In spoken German, the Perfekt is preferred over the Präteritum. Using the Präteritum in normal
conversation may sound unnatural or pretentious.

Gestern habe ich Pizza gegessen. (Yesterday, I ate pizza.)

In contrast to the English present perfect, the German Perfekt is not used to describe events that started in the past and are still ongoing. In
such cases, German speakers use the present tense :

Ich lebe seit drei Jahren hier. (I have been living here for three years.)

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Verbs mostly used in Präteritum


The following verbs are normally not used in the Perfekt. Use Präteritum instead.

English Verb Präteritum

to be sein ich war

to have haben ich hatte

to know wissen ich wusste

may dürfen ich durfte

can können ich konnte

must müssen ich musste

shall sollen ich sollte

want to wollen ich wollte

How is Perfekt formed?


The Perfekt is formed by combining a conjugated form of haben (to have) or sein (to be) in the present tense with the past participle of the
main verb.

Gestern hat er nur zwei Stunden geschlafen. (Yesterday, he only slept for two hours.)

When to use sein


The vast majority of verbs take haben (just like in English).

Verbs that indicate a motion normally take sein as a helper verb. Here are some common examples:

Infinitiv Perfekt

gehen ich bin gegangen

laufen ich bin gelaufen

rennen ich bin gerannt

schwimmen ich bin geschwommen

fliegen ich bin geflogen

However, verbs that indicate some other change also take sein:

Infinitiv Perfekt

aufwachen (wake up) ich bin aufgewacht

einschlafen (fall asleep) ich bin eingeschlafen

sterben (die) er ist gestorben

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There are a few other verbs, for example

bleiben (to stay) - ich bin geblieben


passieren (to happen) - es ist passiert

None of these verbs have an object (they are "intransitive"). If they have a variant with an object ("transitive"), they take haben:

Ich bin im Auto gefahren. (fahren: movement)


Ich habe das Auto gefahren. (you operate the car. The movement is secondary)
Ich bin Auto gefahren. (Auto is NOT an object here. It's a complement, like Deutsch lernen, similar to ein|kaufen

How to form the participle


Regular verbs
Most verbs are regular (these are called "weak"). For these, creating the perfect participle is easy. Just add ge- to the front, and replace the
infinitive ending with -(e)t:

machen - gemacht
arbeiten - gearbeitet

Irregular verbs
German has a number of irregular verbs. Most of these are "strong" verbs. For these, you add ge-, but you add -en. There might be a vowel
change involved. Rarely, the change in the word stem is more drastic.

Infinitiv Partizip II

schlafen geschlafen

trinken getrunken

schwimmen geschwommen

essen gegessen

gehen gegangen

While most verbs are weak, many of the most common verbs are strong.

There is a small group of irregular verbs that follow a different system (called " mixed verbs "). Here are most of them:

Infinitiv Partizip II

wissen gewusst

rennen gerannt

brennen gebrannt

kennen gekannt

denken gedacht

bringen gebracht

Why is there no ge-? Why is it inside the participle?


Once you have the correct form of the basic verb, here are two more rules you need to know:

German verbs have two kinds of prefixes. Some can split off. These are always emphasized:

(einkaufen) Ich kaufe im Supermarkt ein.

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Verbs like this will have the -ge- between the prefix and the verb stem:

Ich habe im Supermarkt eingekauft.


Ich bin im Bus eingeschlafen.

Here are some common prefixes that are always emphasized:

ab-, an-, auf-, aus-, bei-, ein-, mit-, nach-, vor-, zu-

Other prefixes are not emphasized. They never split off. For these (and any other verbs that are not emphasized on the first syllable), do
not add a ge- prefix . This includes all verbs that end in -ieren (as these are emphasized at the -ie-).

(verkaufen) Ich verkaufe mein Auto


Ich habe mein Auto verkauft.
Ich habe gestern verschlafen.
Er hat Musik studiert.

These prefixes are never emphasized:

be-, ent-, er-, ge-, ver-, zer-

A few prefixes might be emphasized or not.

Adjective endings
When an adjective comes before a noun, its ending will change according to this noun.

Die Katze ist alt.

Das ist eine alte Katze.

Article + Adjective
You can think of the adjective endings as "markers", that kind of mark what part of speech the adjective belongs to.

Nominative
Remember that the nominative case is used for the subject of a sentence. These are the nominative adjectives :

gender article adjective noun

masc. der rote Hut

ein roter Hut

neut. das rote Hemd

ein rotes Hemd

fem. die rote Rose

eine rote Rose

Plural die roten Schuhe

keine roten Schuhe

- rote Schuhe

While that might look a bit chaotic, there is not so much going on:

1) Masculine: Either the article, or the adjective must have the -r ending. The same goes for neuter and -s

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Der kleine Hund spielt.


Ein kleiner Hund spielt.

2) Feminine and Plural end in -e. If you add an article, you also have to add an -n.

Die alte Katze schläft.


Alte Katzen schlafen.
Die alten Katzen schlafen.
Das sind keine alten Katzen.

Accusative adjective endings


Do you remember that quite often, the accusative looks like the nominative? Specifically, only the articles for masculine nouns change .

The same goes for the adjectives. They are the same as for nominative; the only exception is for masculine nouns. The changes are marked in
bold in the table below.

3) masculine accusative: adjective ends in -en

Die alte Katze schläft. Der alte Mann sieht die alte Katze (no change)
Die alte Katze sieht den alten Mann.

gender article adjective noun

masc. den roten Hut

einen roten Hut

neut. das rote Hemd

ein rotes Hemd

fem. die rote Rose

eine rote Rose

Plural die roten Schuhe

keine roten Schuhe

- rote Schuhe

Please refer to the previous lessons on adjectives about the endings for nominative and accusative.

Dative
Dative, as always, is even simpler.

4) Dative: all adjectives get an -en ending

gender article adjective noun

masc. dem roten Hut

einem roten Hut

neut. dem roten Hemd

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gender article adjective noun

einem roten Hemd

fem. der roten Rose

einer roten Rose

Plural den roten Schuhen

keinen roten Schuhen

- roten Schuhen

Remember that in dative,

masculine/neuter articles end in -m


feminine articles end in -r
plural articles end in -n
and plural nouns (almost) always end in -n.

Here are some examples:

Der Mann mit dem roten Hemd (the man in the red shirt)
Sie mag Männer mit roten Haaren (She likes men with red hair)

When do dative adjectives not end in -n?


There is a rather rare case when dative adjectives do not end in -en.

Rarely, single nouns will be used without any article. This mostly happens in idiomatic expressions.

mit heißer Feder (with hot feather)


mit großem Eifer (with great verve)

What happens here is that the ending that would normally be used in the article now ends up on the adjective.

Weg vs. weg


Der Weg" (with a long e*) roughly means "the path".

Der Weg ist lang. (The path is long.)

Weg (with a short, open e) roughly means "away".

Here are some examples:

Geh weg! (Go away!)


Ich bin weg! (I'm gone!)

Nominative
Remember that nominative is used for the subject of a sentence. These are the nominative adjectives :

gender article adjective noun

masc. der rote Hut

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gender article adjective noun

ein roter Hut

neut. das rote Hemd

ein rotes Hemd

fem. die rote Rose

eine rote Rose

Plural die roten Schuhe

keine roten Schuhe

- rote Schuhe

While that might look a bit chaotic, there is not so much going on:

1) masculine: Either the article, or the adjective must have the -r ending. The same goes for neuter and -s.

Der kleine Hund spielt.


Ein kleiner Hund spielt.

2) Feminine and Plural end in -e. If you add an article, you also have to add an -n.

Die alte Katze schläft.


Alte Katzen schlafen.
Die alten Katzen schlafen.
Das sind keine alten Katzen.

Trotzdem vs. obwohl


Obwohl translates to "although", while trotzdem translates to "however/nevertheless".

Ich bin müde, obwohl ich Kaffee getrunken habe. (I'm tired, although I drank coffee.)
Ich habe Kaffee getrunken. Trotzdem bin ich müde. (I drank coffee. Nevertheless, I'm tired.)

Trotzdem is an adverb. It is part of a sentence and will replace the subject if it appears in the first position.

Obwohl is a subordinating conjunction. It will send the verb to the last position. See the lesson "Conjunctions" for more details.

Darum, deshalb, deswegen


These three adverbs are synonymous. They can be used interchangeably.

The conjunctions weil and denn are used in the form "Statement, weil/denn Reason".

Ich bin müde, weil ich nicht geschlafen habe. (subordinating conjunction)
Ich bin müde, denn ich habe nicht geschlafen. (coordinating conjunction)

Darum and its sisters are used in the form "Reason, darum Statement" (or "Statement, darum Result").

Ich habe nicht geschlafen. Darum bin ich müde.

Womit? Damit!
Many prepositions can be combined with wo- and da-. Da roughly translates to "that" here, wo normally to "what" (not "where" which is its

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normal meaning).

wo- da-

woran daran

worauf darauf

woraus daraus

wobei dabei

wodurch dadurch

wofür dafür

wogegen dagegen

wohinter dahinter

worin darin

womit damit

wonach danach

worum darum

worüber darüber

worunter darunter

wovon davon

wovor davor

wozu dazu

wozwischen dazwischen

If the preposition starts with a vowel, there will be a binding r. So worum is pronounced "wo-rum", not "wor-um".

When is the Präteritum used?


The Präteritum (also called Imperfekt) is used to describe past events. Its use is mostly limited to formal writing and formal speech. In
informal writing and speech , the Perfekt (e.g. Ich habe geschlafen) tends to be preferred. Using the Präteritum in normal conversation
may sound unnatural or pretentious.

Verbs mostly used in Präteritum


The following verbs are normally not used in the Perfekt. Use Präteritum instead.

English Verb Präteritum

to be sein ich war

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English Verb Präteritum

to have haben ich hatte

to know wissen ich wusste

may dürfen ich durfte

can können ich konnte

must müssen ich musste

shall sollen ich sollte

want to wollen ich wollte

Möchten
The verb möchten (would like to/to want to), which is technically the subjunctive of mögen, does not have a preterite form. Instead, the
preterite of wollen (to want [to]) is used.

How is the Präteritum formed?

Regular weak verbs


The Präteritum of regular weak verbs is formed by adding -(e)te, -(e)test, -(e)ten, or -(e)tet to the stem.

sagen (to say)

Present Präteritum

ich sage (I say) ich sagte (I said)

du sagst (you say) du sagtest (you said)

er/sie/es sagt (he/she/it says) er/sie/es sagte (he/she/it said)

wir sagen (we say) wir sagten (we said)

ihr sagt (you say) ihr sagtet (you said)

sie/Sie sagen (they/you say) sie/Sie sagten (they/you said)

Irregular weak verbs


Some weak verbs, although generally regular, have a slightly irregular verb stem in the Präteritum. These are mostly modal verbs. Be sure
not to use the umlaut in the Präteritum for these, as that will change it to the Konjunktiv II (subjunctive) mood.

The endings will be the same as for other weak verbs.

haben - ich hatte, du hattest, …


können - ich konnte, du konntest, …
müssen - ich musste, du musstest, …
dürfen - ich durfte, du durftest, …

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Strong verbs
To form the Präteritum of strong verbs, you need to find the modified verb stem first. Google "German irregular verbs" to get a list.

To this modified stem, you add the following endings:

Person Ending

ich -

du -st

er/sie/es -

wir -en

ihr -t

sie/Sie -en

Notice that these are the same endings as for the modal verbs in the present tense. First and third person are the same in singular and
plural.

finden (to find)

Present Präteritum

ich finde (I find) ich fand (I found)

du findest (you find) du fandest (you found)

er/sie/es findet (he/she/it finds) er/sie/es fand (he/she/it found)

wir finden (we find) wir fanden (we found)

ihr findet (you find) ihr fandet (you found)

sie/Sie finden (they/you find) sie/Sie fanden (they/you found)

sein (to be)

Present Präteritum

ich bin (I am) ich war (I was)

du bist (you are) du warst (you were)

er/sie/es ist (he/she/it is) er/sie/es war (he/she/it was)

wir sind (we are) wir waren (we were)

ihr seid (you are) ihr wart (you were)

sie/Sie sind (they/you are) sie/Sie waren (they/you were)

Gewitter
Das Gewitter refers to bad weather with lightning and thunder, not necessarily to strong winds. Hence, we do not accept the translation

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"storm" in this course.

Hose, Schere, Brille


Pants used to be two hoses, until somebody had the idea of stitching them together. Glasses are now joined into one object. If you
deconstruct scissors into multiple objects, you have two awkward knives and a screw.

German uses the singular for all of these. Die Hose is "a pair of pants". Die Hosen (plural) is at least two pairs of pants.

Stelle
Die Stelle has the meaning of "position" in at least two ways. It can be a location, or it can be a job position.

Geschenk, Gift
The common German word German for "gift" is das Geschenk. Das Gift means "poison" . The reason is that a long time ago, "gift" in the
meaning of "something that is given" was used as an euphemism for poison.

"Why did he die?"


"Kunigunde gave him something."

The original meaning survives in the word die Mitgift (dowry).

Phones and cellphones


Believe it or not, people still use landline phones, especially in business contexts. A (tele)phone can be a cellphone or a landline phone. The
word (tele)phone is to the word cellphone what the word pet is to the word dog, i.e. generic vs. specific.

the tele(phone) = das Telefon

the cellphone (the mobile phone) = das Handy / das Mobiltelefon

Regardless of whether you always refer to your cellphone as a phone, in this course, you will not be able to use (tele)phone/Telefon and
cellphone/Handy interchangeably.

Rufen, anrufen
Rufen translates to "call":

Ich rufe meinen Hund. (I call my dog.)

The word used for calling via phone is anrufen:

Ich rufe meinen Bruder an. (I call my brother.)

Because people used to call the police long before phones existed, German uses rufen for this:

Ich ruf(e) die Polizei!!

Informationen
Unlike English, the German word die Information has a singular and a plural form.

Fernseher, Fernsehen

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Der Fernseher refers to a TV set. Das Fernsehen refers to TV in general.

Ich habe gestern einen Fernseher gekauft. (I bought a TV yesterday.)


Ich bin im Fernsehen! (I'm on TV!)

"Ich bin im Fernseher!" would mean "I'm inside the TV set!".

Fernsehen, frühstücken
Ich sehe fern. Ich habe ferngesehen.
Ich frühstücke. Ich habe gefrühstückt.

Why does one split, but not the other?

Sehen is interpreted as a verb by itself. Thus, fern is interpreted as the prefix. Because it is emphasized, it will split off. Because it splits off, the
-ge- of the participle will end up inside the word.

Stücken is not a verb. Frühstücken is a verb that was created from the noun das Frühstück . Hence, the first syllable, although emphasized, will
not split off.

Werden + Infinitiv = Futur


German normally uses the present tense to indicate the future.

Ich gehe morgen ins Kino. (I will go to the movies tomorrow.)

On some occasions (for example when making promises or predictions), German does use a future tense. It is very similar to the one in
English.

The future tense consists of a conjugated form of werden in the present tense and an infinitive (the base form of the verb).

German English

ich werde spielen I will play

du wirst spielen you will play

er/sie/es wird spielen he/she/it will play

wir werden spielen we will play

ihr werdet spielen you will play

sie/Sie werden spielen they/you will play

Depending on the context, ich werde spielen translates to "I will play" or "I am going to play". In German, there is no distinction between
"will" and "going to".

Be aware that the German verb wollen (to want) is a false friend of the English "will" :

Ich will spielen! (I want to play!)

Werden has three different functions


Using werden can be confusing for learners. However, there are clear distinctions between its three main uses :

Werden + adjective/noun = "to become"

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If werden is used in combination with an adjective or noun, the meaning will be "to become" or "to get":

Sie wird Mutter. (She's becoming a mother.)


Ich werde müde. (I'm getting tired.)

The German word bekommen is a confusing false friend to "become":

Sie bekommt eine Tochter. (She's getting a daughter.)

Werden + Infinitiv = Futur


This case is explained above.

Werden + past participle = passive


If used in combination with a participle, werden creates one type of passive:

Der Taxifahrer fährt den Fahrgast. (The taxi driver drives the passenger.)
Der Fahrgast wird gefahren. (The passenger is being driven.)

Die Seite
Die Seite can mean "the side" or "the page", depending on context.

Ich stehe auf der anderen Seite. (I am standing on the other side.)
Ich lese die Seite. (I read the page.)

In the context of the internet, it refers to a web page, as well as to a web site.

WLAN
WLAN is pronounced [ˈveːlaːn] in German. Unfortunately, the computer voice of the German course refuses to acknowledge this, and insists
on pronouncing it wrong.

Drucken vs. drücken


Drucken means "to print". The machine commonly used for that is der Drucker .

Ich muss noch zehn Seiten drucken! (I have to print ten more pages!)

Drücken means "to press". Der Drücker may refer to an electric button, or to a hug.

Der Drücker am Aufzug ist kaputt. (The button of the lift is broken.)
Drücker! (Hugs!)

Past perfect

When is the past perfect used?


The past perfect is used to describe past events, more specifically events that happened way back in the past or any time before another
event in the past.

past perfect preterite

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past perfect preterite

Ich hatte ihn schon gesehen, als er mich sah

I had already seen him when he saw me

How is the past perfect formed?


The past perfect is formed almost the same way as the Perfekt. The only difference is that the helper verb will be in the past tense:

Ich habe gegessen. (I have eaten.)


Ich hatte gegessen. (I had eaten.)

Ich bin geschwommen. (I have swum.)

Ich war geschwommen. (I had swum.)

How to end up with the right participle?


Refer to the "Perfect" lesson in order to review how to form the perfect participle that goes with it.

Student or Schüler?
A Student is a university student and a Schüler is a pupil/student at a primary, secondary or high school. Students attending other types of
schools such as language or dancing schools may also be called Schüler.

A Hochschule is not a high school


Careful: a Hochschule is not a high school. Depending on the context, Hochschule is either an umbrella term that comprises Unversitäten and
Fachhochschulen, or it's a synonym for Fachhochschule.

A Universität is a full research university and a Fachhochschule (often just called Hochschule) is a university with a practical focus that offers
Bachelor and Master degrees. PhD programmes may be offered in cooperation with other universities.

A Gymnasium is not a gym


In German, the word das Gymnasium refers to a university prep-school.

The German for a sports gym is die Turnhalle (used by schools and sports clubs) or das Fitnessstudio (commercial).

Future Perfect
The future perfect talks about actions that will have been completed in the future. It's used pretty much like the English future perfect, but
it's formed slightly differently.

The future perfect consists of the future tense of the auxiliary verb haben or sein, and the past participle of the main verb.

Haben vs. sein


The vast majority of verbs take haben. Verbs that take sein have to be intransitive, i.e. they can't take an object, and they have to indicate a
change of position or condition. sein (to be), bleiben (to stay), and passieren (to happen) take sein even though they don't indicate a change
of position or condition.

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Please refer to the "Perfect" lesson to review how to form the participle, and for more details on when to use haben or sein.

Future Perfect with haben


essen (to eat):

The auxiliary verb that goes with essen is haben. All you need to do is form the future tense of haben (ich werde haben) and add the past
participle of the main verb essen (gegessen) to the left of haben.

German English

ich werde gegessen haben I will have eaten

du wirst gegessen haben you will have eaten

er/sie/es wird gegessen haben he/she/it will have eaten

wir werden gegessen haben we will have eaten

ihr werdet gegessen haben you will have eaten

sie werden gegessen haben they will have eaten

Sie werden gegessen haben you will have eaten

Future Perfect with sein


gehen (to leave/to go):

The auxiliary verb that goes with gehen is sein. All you need to do is form the future tense of sein (ich werde sein) and add the past participle
of the main verb gehen (gegangen) to the left of sein.

German English

ich werde gegangen sein I will have left

du wirst gegangen sein you will have left

er/sie/es wird gegangen sein he/she/it will have left

wir werden gegangen sein we will have left

ihr werdet gegangen sein you will have left

sie werden gegangen sein they will have left

Sie werden gegangen sein you will have left

Naja, na und, na sowas


Na appears in some short interjections or phrases:

Example English

naja "Was ist das Problem?" — "Naja, dein Hund stinkt." Well…

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Example English

na und "Dein Hund stinkt." — "Na und?" so what?

na klar "Stinkt dein Hund?" — "Na klar!" of course!

na sowas "Dein Hund tanzt" — "Na sowas!" Oh wow!

Motor, Motoren
Normally, nouns don't change the stress pattern when they change into the plural:

Elefant, Elefanten
Gelegenheit, Gelegenheiten

Nouns ending in -or are an exception. In the plural, the emphasis lands on the -or- syllable.

Doktor, Doktoren
Motor, Motoren

Reflexive verbs
Reflexive verbs are pretty common in many European languages, but in comparison are rather rare in English:

He hurt himself.
She found herself.

In German, they are more frequent. Sometimes, they make perfect sense:

Ich wasche mich. ("I wash myself", as opposed to my dog)

But often, the reason for using this form is lost in history, and the verb just has to be learned as is:

Ich befinde mich im Garten. ("I'm in the garden", literally "I find myself in the garden")
Sie setzt sich hin. ("She sits down", lit. "She seats hearself")
Ich erinnere mich nicht. ("I don't remember" (myself))

Verb objects
Remember that verbs often have a "direct object". This will be in the accusative case:

Der Mann isst einen Apfel.

Some verbs have an additional "indirect object", which will be in the dative case:

Der Mann gibt dem Kind einen Apfel. (The man gives an apple to the child.)

The reflexive pronoun will take the place of one of these objects.

Replacing the "lost" object


Because the reflexive part takes up the object, some reflexive verbs need a preposition to go with them. This preposition has to be
learned together with the verb.

sich interessieren für (to have an interest in)


sich freuen auf (to look forward to)
sich freuen über (to be happy about)
sich kümmern um (to care for)

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sich treffen mit (to meet with)

Accusative reflexive verbs


In most reflexive verbs, the direct object gets replaced by the reflexive pronoun. Thus, use the accusative versions.

Ich rasiere mich. ("I shave", literally "I shave myself")

Dative reflexive verbs


If the verb already has a direct (accusative) object, the reflexive pronoun will be in the dative case :

First, consider this example (mich is in the accusative):

Ich wasche mich. (I wash, literally "I wash myself")

In the next example, "die Haare" is the Accusative object. Hence, the reflexive pronoun is in the dative ("mir"):

Ich wasche mir die Haare. ("I wash my hair", literally "I wash the hairs to myself")

Here are some verbs with dative reflexive pronouns:

Ich wünsche mir einen Hund. (I wish for a dog.)


Ich sehe mir den Film an. (I watch the movie.)
Ich habe mir das Bein gebrochen. (I broke my leg.)

Reflexive pronouns
Here is a review of the normal pronouns:

nom. acc. dat.

ich mich mir

du dich dir

er/sie/es ihn/sie/es ihm/ihr/ihm

wir uns uns

ihr euch euch

sie/Sie sie/Sie ihnen/Ihnen

Notice that for wir and ihr, accusative and dative do not differ.

Here are the accusative and dative reflexive pronouns:

nom. acc. refl. dat. refl.

ich mich mir

du dich dir

er/sie/es sich sich

wir uns uns

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nom. acc. refl. dat. refl.

ihr euch euch

sie/Sie sich sich

The reflexive pronoun for the third person (singular and plural) is sich. Otherwise, they don't differ from their non-reflexive
counterparts.

This means that if you see a sentence such as:

Er wäscht ihm die Füße.

It must be a different person: He washes the feet of somebody else. If it were his own feet, the sentence would be:

Er wäscht sich die Füße.

Post
Die Post has several meanings in German.

It can refer to the mail in your mailbox:

Ist die Post schon da? (Has the mail arrived yet?)

It can also refer to the post office:

Gehst du heute zur Post? (Are you going to the post office today?)

Or, it can refer to the mail company (which used to be state run in Germany):

Die Post hat die Gebühren erhöht. (The mail company raised their fees.)

Fabrik
Don't confuse die Fabrik (the manufacturing plant) with the English word "fabric". The former is the place where something is fabricated, the
latter is the fabricated product of the world's first manufacturing plants (hence the name).

In addition, die Fabrik is stressed on the last syllable.

Geschichte
In German, the words for "story" and "history" are the same (just as in Spanish).

However, they are used differently. When used with an article, it generally refers to a story:

Hast du die Geschichte gelesen? (Did you read the story?)

Most of the time, when referring to history, there won't be an article:

Ich habe Geschichte studiert. (I studied history at university.)

In addition, only "story" will have a plural version:

Er erzählt lustige Geschichten. (He tells funny stories.)

Drucken vs. drücken


Drucken means "to print". The machine commonly used for that is der Drucker .

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Ich muss noch zehn Seiten drucken! (I have to print ten more pages!)

Der Drucker ist kaputt! (The printer is broken!)

Drücken means "to press". Der Drücker may refer to an electric button, or to a hug.

Der Drücker am Aufzug ist kaputt. (The button of the lift is broken.)
Drücker! (Hugs!)

Slightly confusingly, der Druck can refer to "pressure", but also to a "print".

Mach keinen Druck! (Don't create stress!)


Der Druck ist schön. (The print is nice.)

Affen
In German, der Affe may refer to all primates, or to all primates excluding lemurs.

In everyday English, "apes" tend to be distinguished from other primates, most of which are referred to as "monkeys". German does not
make this distinction. If you want to refer to apes only, you can use the word Menschenaffen.

Kamele
Das Kamel is stressed on the last syllable: [kaˈmeːl]. Unfortunately, Duolingo's computer voice has other ideas about this. When you're in
Cologne, don't confuse these adorable, but weighty animals with Kamelle ([kaˈmɛlə], caramels traditionally thrown around during Karneval).

Telefonieren, anrufen
Telefonieren does not have an object (it is "intransitive"). Hence, you need a preposition for the other person:

Ich telefoniere mit meiner Mutter. (I'm on the phone with my mother.)

On the other hand, anrufen has an accusative object:

Ich rufe meine Mutter an. (I call my mother.)

Remember that for the police, you would use rufen (without the an-):

Ruf die Polizei! (Call the police!)

Wechseln, tauschen
Tauschen generally means to swap, or to change something:

Komm, wir tauschen unsere Hüte! (Come, we swap our hats!)

Austauschen or (aus)wechseln mean to exchange/substitute:

Er tauscht die Batterien aus. (He exchanges the batteries.)


Er wechselt die Batterien (aus).

Wechseln by itself can also mean "to switch/change":

Er wechselt den Fußballverein. (He switches the soccer club.)


Er wechselt die Socken. (He changes his socks.)

This is also the word used for changing money:

Ich muss noch Geld wechseln. (I have to change money first.)

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Hirn, Gehirn
The words das Gehirn und das Hirn are used more or less interchangeably in German.

Drucken vs. drücken


Drucken means "to print". The machine commonly used for that is der Drucker .

Ich muss noch zehn Seiten drucken! (I have to print ten more pages!)

Der Drucker ist kaputt! (The printer is broken!)

Drücken means "to press". Der Drücker may refer to an electric button, or to a hug.

Der Drücker am Aufzug ist kaputt. (The button of the lift is broken.)
Drücker! (Hugs!)

Slightly confusingly, der Druck can refer to "pressure", but also to a "print".

Mach keinen Druck! (Don't create stress!)


Der Druck ist schön. (The print is nice.)

Wunderbar
Due to its use as a loanword in English, wunderbar is often overused by English-speaking learners of German. Contrary to popular opinion,
most Germans don't run around in leather trousers, smiling broadly and shouting Wunderbar! at each other :)

Think of it as the equivalent to "splendid!". If you want to sound less antiquated, better use Super! or Toll! or something like that.

Conditional mood
The conditional mood is mostly used for wishes or unreal situations.

I wish I had a parrot!


If I were you, I would sleep more.

Use würde for most verbs


Where English uses would, German uses forms of würde:

German English

ich würde spielen I would play

du würdest spielen you would play

er/sie/es würde spielen he/she/it would play

wir würden spielen we would play

ihr würdet spielen you would play

sie/Sie würden spielen they/you would play

Some verbs have their own forms

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Sometimes, English uses special forms for the Conditional. These generally look like Simple Past forms:

Yesterday, I had a dream.


I wish I had a dream.

In German, these two forms are also similar. However, German normally adds an umlaut change (and occasional -e) :

person Präteritum Conditional

ich war wäre

du warst wär(e)st

er/sie/es war wäre

wir waren wären

ihr wart wär(e)t

sie/Sie waren wären

Apart from the sein, haben and the modal verbs, only a few verbs are still conjugated directly. For most verbs, this is now unusual, and
considered old-fashioned. Use würde + infinitive instead.

To show you the pattern, here are the forms for haben (to have), dürfen (may) and geben (to give):

person haben dürfen geben

(Präteritum: ich) (hatte) (durfte) (gab)

ich hätte dürfte gäbe

du hättest dürftest gäbst

er/sie/es hätte dürfte gäbe

wir hätten dürften gäben

ihr hättet dürftet gäbt

sie/Sie hätten dürften gäben

For the other modal verbs, the forms for ich are:

müssen - müsste
wollen - wollte (no umlaut change!)
sollen - sollte (also no umlaut change)

Here are some other verbs that use their own form for the Conditional:

gehen (to go) - ginge


wissen (to know) - wüsste
wünschen (to wish) - wünschte
tun (to do) - täte
brauchen (to need) - bräuchte

Again, for most other verbs, use würde + infinitive.

Equals

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There are several ways to talk about equations:

Vier plus drei macht sieben.


Zwei plus zwei ist vier.
Eins plus fünf (ist) gleich sechs.
Sieben plus acht ergibt fünfzehn.

These are all equivalent (ha!).

Das Konto, die Konten


Most nouns in German for the plural by appending an ending. There might be an umlaut change.

der Hund, die Hunde


das Haus, die Häuser

A few loanwords will instead replace the singular ending with a different one:

das Konto, die Konten

You will learn more of these in the skill "Business 2".

Party, Partei
Die Party, an English loanword, refers to a celebration. A political party will be die Partei .

Conditional Perfect
Conditional Perfect works just as normal Perfect, but uses the conditional form of haben instead. So,

Ich habe ihn gesehen.

becomes

Ich hätte ihn gesehen.

For verbs that use sein instead, use the conditional form of sein:

Ich bin Auto gefahren.

becomes

Ich wäre Auto gefahren.

Be aware that in some verbs, such as behalten, verlassen, erfahren, the Participle looks like the Infinitive. Don't let that confuse you, always
use the Participle!

Firma
Most verbs in German get their plural by attaching an ending. There might be an umlaut change:

der Hund, die Hunde


das Haus, die Häuser

A few verbs (from Ancient Greek and Latin) will instead replace a singular ending with a different plural ending:

das Museum, die Museen (same for Zentrum, etc.)


die Firma, die Firmen
das Konto, die Konten
das Virus, die Viren

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das Visum, die Visa

The power of machen


Machen (to do) is a very versatile word. Often, when you don't know the word for an action, you can somehow use machen do describe it.
Often, there is even an existing word combination:

Here are some examples. The "higher-level" word is in brackets.

aufmachen (öffnen) — to open


zumachen (schließen) — to close
besser machen (verbessern) — to improve
wegmachen (entfernen) — to remove

As a fallback, it can help you to just continue speaking, even when you run the risk making up your own words:

Ich muss den Brief noch machen. (very bad German, but people will get what you mean)

As a general rule: It's better to speak bad German, than to stop speaking, just because you don't know how to say it well. Keep going, and
learn from your mistakes.

Fake it, till you make it :)

Plastik
Plastik is one of the few words that changes meaning, depending on which gender it is.

das Plastik (artificial material, normally from petroleum)


die Plastik (a word for "sculpture")

Passive with werden


In German, werden + perfect participle forms a passive:

Ich schreibe einen Brief. (I write a letter.)


Ein Brief wird geschrieben. (A letter is being written.)

Note that the accusative object of an active sentence (einen Brief) becomes the (nominative) subject of the passive version (ein Brief).

The passive is often used when the original subject is unknown or irrelevant:

Mein Handy wurde gestohlen! ("My phone was stolen!" — You don't know who did it.)
Mein Handy wurde repariert. ("My phone was fixed." — You don't care by whom.)

Werden has three different functions


Using werden can be confusing for learners. However, there are clear distinctions between its three main uses :

Werden + adjective/noun = "to become"


If werden is used in combination with an adjective or noun, the meaning will be "to become" or "to get":

Sie wird Mutter. (She's becoming a mother.)


Ich werde müde. (I'm getting tired.)

The German word bekommen is a confusing false friend to "become":

Sie bekommt eine Tochter. (She's getting a daughter.)

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Werden + Infinitiv = Futur


Refer to the lesson "Future 2" for details.

Werden + past participle = passive


If used in combination with a participle, werden creates one type of passive:

Der Taxifahrer fährt den Fahrgast. (The taxi driver drives the passenger.)
Der Fahrgast wird gefahren. (The passenger is being driven.)

Conditional mood
Please refer to lesson "Verbs: Conditional 1" to review to German's "Konjunktiv II" mood. This is normally formed by a form of würden +
infinitive:

Wenn ich reich wäre, würde ich den ganzen Tag Deutsch lernen. (If I were rich, I would learn German all day.)

Konjunktiv I
German has another, lesser used form, the "Konjunktiv I". It is mostly used for marking indirect speech in newspapers:

Sänger: "Der Song ist gut!" (direct speech)


Der Sänger sagte, der Song sei gut. (indirect speech)

Therefore, only the third person (singular and plural) is commonly used.

Here are the forms of present tense and past tense (Präteritum), together with the two forms of Konjunktiv, to demonstrate the pattern.
Forms in brackets are rarely used:

person present Konj I

ich habe (habe)

du hast (habest)

er/sie/es hat habe

wir haben (haben)

ihr habt (habet)

sie/Sie haben (haben)

person Präteritum Konj II

ich hatte hätte

du hattest hättest

er/sie/es hatte hätte

wir hatten hätten

ihr hattet hättet

sie/Sie hatten hätten

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As you can see, Konjunktiv I is sometimes the same as the present tense form. In these cases, German uses the Konjunktiv II form:

Männer: "Wir haben Hunde!" (direct speech)


Die Männer sagten, sie hätten Hunde. (indirect speech; uses hätten instead of haben)

Here are some commonly used forms:

sein (to be) — er sei


haben (have) — er habe
müssen (must) — er müsse
können (can) — er könne
wollen (want) — er wolle

Der/Die Außerirdische: adjectival nouns


Some adjectives can turn into nouns in German. If they do so, they still change endings like any normal adjective:

deutsch (German) — der Deutsche


gefangen (captive) — der Gefangene
alt (old) — der Alte
außerirdisch (extraterrestrial) — der Außerirdische
verwandt (related) — der Verwandte

der deutsche Mann — der Deutsche

ein deutscher Mann — ein Deutscher


Ich kenne einen deutschen Mann — Ich kenne einen Deutschen.
eine deutsche Frau — eine Deutsche
der Hund der deutschen Frau — der Hund der Deutschen

… and so on.

Google "german adjectival nouns" for more information.

If you want, now would be a good time to review the adjective endings in earlier lessons :)

N-declension
Don't confuse adjectival nouns with nouns that follow the "n-declension". (See lesson "Dative" for details)

For example, all other nouns for nationalities that end in -e follow the n-declension:

der Brite, der Chinese, der Ire, …

Relative clauses
In English, relative clauses look like this:

The girl who came to visit him was his aunt.


The man, whose daughter worked as a manager, came home.

In German, relative clauses are subordinate clauses. The verb moves from position 2 to the end.

Der Mann kauft Hundefutter. Ihm gehört der Hund. (The man buys dog food. The dog belongs to him.)
Der Mann, dem der Hund gehört, kauft Hundefutter. (The man to whom the dog belongs buys dog food.)

Relative clauses are always set off by commas from the rest of the sentence.

(There's no distinction between restrictive and non-restrictive clauses.)

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Relative pronouns
The relative pronouns look like the definite articles, with the exception of the dative plural and the genitive forms.

The relative pronouns closely correspond to the personal pronouns they replace:

Das ist der Mann. Er hat einen Hund.


Das ist der Mann, der einen Hund hat.

Das sind die Bälle. Mit ihnen spielt er. (These are the balls. He plays with them.)

Das sind die Bälle, mit denen er spielt.

pers. pronoun rel. pronoun grammar

er der masc. (nom.)

es das neut. (nom.+acc.)

sie die fem./pl. (nom.+acc.)

ihn den masc. (acc.)

ihm dem masc.+neut. (dat.)

ihr der fem. (dat.)

ihnen denen pl. (dat.)

Relative pronouns can never be dropped.

Genitive relative clauses


The genitive version derives from the possessive pronoun:

Die Frau ist krank. Ihr Sohn hat einen Hund.


Die Frau, deren Sohn einen Hund hat, ist krank.

Der Mann mag Pizza. Seine Tochter kann singen. (The man likes pizza. His daughter can sing.)

Der Mann, dessen Tochter singen kann, mag Pizza.

Here, too, the possessive pronouns correspond somewhat to the relative pronouns:

poss. pronoun rel. pronoun grammar

sein(*) dessen masc./neut.

ihr(*) deren fem./pl.

The relative clause determines which pronoun to use


Be aware that the relevant case is in the relative clause, not the main clause:

Der Hund schläft. (Hund = nominative)


Ich mag den Hund. (Hund = accusative)
Der Hund, den ich mag, schläft. (use accusative relative pronoun)

The form you need to use is governed by the grammatical gender and number of the word that is being referred to (outside the relative
clause), and the case is governed by the context of the relative clause.

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Keep in mind that certain prepositions and verbs always trigger a certain case, e.g. the preposition mit always takes the dative case and so
does the verb helfen.

Das Kind schläft. Die Frau hat ihm geholfen. (The kid sleeps. The woman helped him.)
Das Kind, dem die Frau geholfen hat, schläft.

What is a Wurst?
A Wurst is a sausage. It does not specifically refer to any kind of sausage. It could be a salami, chorizo, mortadella, frankfurter, etc.

Bratwurst specifically refers to a fried or grilled sausage.

Congratulations! :)
Welcome to the last lesson of this course!

We hope you got a good first impression on how German works and thinks. But your journey should not end here :) Find other speakers, get
some learning material, and/or keep using this course.

Wir wünschen dir alles Gute!

Extra!

Dieses/Jenes
There is no such clear cut difference in German as in English between this and that. In principle, there are the two forms dieses (this) and
jenes (that), but Germans pretty much never use "jenes" anymore. We just always use the same.

Then you have a big difference between spoken German and written German. Spoken German is a lot more colloquial and often uses words
with special emphases to mean different things; since you can't see the emphasis in written German, we tend to use more distinct words
there.

So let's start with das. Normally, it's just an article for neuter words, like "das Auto". But if you use it without any noun it refers to, it becomes
a demonstrative pronoun:

Das Auto ist schön - the car is nice.

Das ist schön - this is nice.

Since it doesn't refer to anything in particular, it doesn't get any flection. Whatever you currently do or see or experience, it is nice.

Now if you want to talk about a specific noun and use a demonstrative like "this car", you use dieses. Since it refers to a noun which has a
gender and also a case, you have to decline it according to the noun:

This car is nice - dieses Auto ist schön. (nominative sg neuter)

This dog is dangerous - dieser Hund ist gefährlich. (nominative sg masc.)

This cat is black - diese Katze ist schwarz. (nominative sg. fem)

These children are loud - diese Kinder sind laut. (nominative pl)

I like this dog - ich mag diesen Hund (accussative sg. masc.)

and so on. You can look the tables up.

You can actually drop the noun here, but you still match the pronoun to the item you refer to:

Dieser Ring gefällt mir - I like this ring.

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Dieser gefällt mir - I like this one.

You mean a specific noun without naming the noun, so this one is a pretty good translation in my opinion. Compare to unspecific "I like this"
- "ich mag das".

So far is what you would probably use in writing. In speech, you sometimes use the article as a demonstrative, but then it gets a flection, too.
You have to lay heavy emphasis on the article to convey that you use it as demonstrative pronoun:

Der Hund ist gefährlich - the dog is dangerous.

Der Hund ist gefährlich - this dog is dangerous.

again, you can drop the noun but keep the declinated form and the emphasis:

Der ist gefährlich - this one is dangerous.

At last, we have dies without any ending. You can use it the same way you used das as a demonstrative in the example above:

Das ist schön - this is nice.

Dies ist schön - this is nice.

It sounds a little more stilted. You would mostly hear it while someone points a finger and explains something, but using das is correct then
as well, so you can easily live without dies.

There are some more obscure demonstrative pronouns in german, like the aforementioned jener, derjenige, derselbe and solcher, but you
don't need to worry about them for now.

Conjuctions
Conjuctions are fairly easy, there are just two different kinds. The ones who connect two or more main clauses, and the ones who connect a
subclause to the main clause.

TYPE1: CONNECTING MAIN CLAUSES: ABER (BUT), DENN (BECAUSE), ODER (OR), SONDERN (THE "OTHER" BUT, AFTER A NEGATION), UND
(AND)

The first main clause ends with a comma before aber, denn + sondern, but you don't need one in front of und + oder. After that, the second
main clause is placed with the same word order as the first (verb second in statements, verb first in questions and commands).

If the subject and/or verb in the second clause is the same as in the first, you can omit them, unless you have the conjunction denn (don't
ask me why):

Ich liege im Bett, aber (ich) kann nicht schlafen.

Wir gehen jetzt, denn wir (!) müssen den Bus noch erreichen.

Ich will keinen Kaffee, sondern (ich will) Tee.

Wir laufen und ihr (lauft) auch.

Soll ich gehen oder (soll ich) bleiben?

These conjuctions do not take up a "spot" in the sentence, so you don't count them when you determine where the verb has to go.

und + oder can also connect subclauses:

Ich fragte ihn, ob er noch bleiben (könne) und (er) mit mir das Spiel ansehen könne.

Es ist mir egal, ob du mir zuhörst oder (ob du mir) nicht (zuhörst).

As you can see, it's a little difficult in which of those you then can actually leave out the recurring parts, but that's a problem for a different
explanation, okay? You can always write them all down if you are unsure, it's not that elegant, but it is grammatically correct.

There are also some two-part conjuctions: "sowohl... als auch" (as well as), "weder...noch" (neither...nor), "Entweder...oder" (either...or),
"zwar...aber" (in fact... but), "nicht nur... sondern auch" (not only... but also), where each clause gets preceeded by one of these parts.

TYPE2: CONNECTING A MAIN CLAUSE WITH A SUBCLAUSE

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There are a big bunch of those and you can find many of them here: http://www.canoo.net/services/OnlineGrammar/Wort/Konjunktion
/Gebrauch/subord.html

The most important part to remember is that the subclause always begins with them. The clauses also are always separated by a comma. The
actual order of the clauses however is your choice:

Ich weiß, dass du mich liebst! (main clause, subclause)

Dass du mich liebst, weiß ich. (subclause, main clause)

Note that in the second example, the word order of the main clause is twisted. This is because the subordinate clause actually counts as
"spot 1" of the sentence, so it is immediately followed by the main verb in "spot 2".

The word order of the subordinate clause stays unaffected, the verb still comes at the end of the clause. Another fixed position is the subject
of the subclause (du), which always comes directly after the conjuction. You can not slip it around.

Nicht
The placement of nicht is really pretty complicated, and I don't think I can give you a rule that fits for every sentence, but there are some
guidelines I can give you.

If you want to negate an adverb(ial), you put the nicht in front of it:

Das Hemd ist nicht grün - the shirt is not green.

If you want to negate an adjective, you don't use nicht at all, but kein(e):

Das ist kein grünes Hemd - this is not a green shirt.

That's because you really negate the unspecified noun in this sentence:

Das ist kein Hemd - this is not a shirt.

But if you want to negate a specific noun, you set the nicht in front of everything that specifies it:

Das ist nicht das grüne Hemd - this is not the green shirt

What's left to do is to negate the verb, and here it gets complicated.

To negate a verb, you put the nicht at the end of the sentence, because you negate the action of the whole sentence:

Er findet das grüne Hemd nicht - he does not find the green shirt.

That sounds easy enough, but if you have more than one verb, you may already know that they get piled up at the end of the clause too.
And let's just say they bully the nicht a little back in line:

Er kann das grüne Hemd nicht finden - he cannot find the green shirt.

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