Archive:Introduction to German

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Unit Summary

• Course code: ALAU101:
• Suggested Prerequisites:
  • ...
• Time investment:
• Assessment suggestions:
• Faculty: Humanities
• School: School:Language and Literature
• Department: Topic:Language Aquisition
• Stream German Stream
• Level: Beginner

Unit materials

• Study guide:
• Wikipedia article: w: __Article Name__

Learning materials and learning projects can be used by multiple departments. Cooperate with other departments that use the same learning resource.

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Learning materials and learning projects are located in the main Wikiversity namespace. Simply make a link to the name of the lesson (lessons are independent pages in the main namespace) and start writing!

Texts

An open-ended German book.

• German wikibook

Lessons

• The Pronouns <--Needs to be numbered in a good place when other lessons are written (probably first).

• Introduction to basic German verbs <--Needs to be numbered in a good place when other lessons are written.

Typing German characters into a computer

For a PC, you have quick access by typing the following:
ß - alt+0223
ä - alt+0228
ö - alt+0246
ü - alt+0252

On a Mac, the commands are as follows:
ß - ⌥ + s
ä - ⌥ + u, u
ö - ⌥ + u, o
ü - ⌥ + u, u

Note: the umlaut can be assigned to any vowel by first holding '⌥' and pressing the 'u' key. It will then wait for a vowel key to be pressed.

Vocabulary

Expressions of Time

Specific Time

German	English
die Zeit	time
die Stunde	hour
die Minute	minute
die Sekunde	second

Generic Times

German	English
der Tag	day
der Morgen	morning
der Mittag	midday/noon
der Nachmittag	afternoon
der Abend	evening
die Nacht	night
die Mitternacht	midnight

Past/Future/Present

German	English
gestern	yesterday
heute	today
morgen	tomorrow

Common Greetings

German	English
guten Tag	Hello/Good Day
Tag!	(shorter version of above)
grüß dich!	Hello (informal/regional)
Ich heiße...	My name is...
wie geht's?	How are you?

Numbers

German	English
eins	one
zwei	two
drei	three
vier	four
fünf	five
sechs	six
sieben	seven
acht	eight
neun	nine
zehn	ten

• Eleven and twelve are irregular:

German	English
elf	eleven
zwölf	twelve

• Numbers 13 through 19 are created as follows:

First digit number + 'zehn'  

German	English
dreizehn	thirteen
vierzehn	fourteen
fünfzehn	fifteen
sechzehn	sixteen
siebzehn	seventeen
achtzehn	eighteen
neunzehn	nineteen

Note: The "-s" in "Sechs" and the "-en" in "Sieben" are dropped in the combination.

Double Digits

• In German, two digit numbers are created by:

 adding the suffix "-zig." (similar to English "-ty").  

German	English
zwanzig	twenty
dreizig	thirty
vierzig	forty
fünfzig	fifty
sechzig	sixty
siebzig	seventy
achtzig	eighty
neunzig	ninety

Note: The spellings of zwanzig (20), dreißig (30), sechzig (60), and siebzig (70) are irregular.

• Two digit numbers that do not end with zero are made as follows:

first digit + und + second digit

Examples:

German	English
einundzwanzig	21
siebunddreißig	37
sechsundvierzig	46
vierundsechzig	64
neunundneunzig	99

• Large numbers are similar to English:

German	English
hundert	100
tausend	1.000
million	1.000.000
miolliarde	1.000.000.000
triollion	1.000.000.000.000

Note: Periods (.) are used to divide large numbers into groups of three, as opposed to commas (,).

• Commas are used as decomal points:

1.001 = "one thousand"
1,001 = "one point zero zero one"

Sports

German	English
der Amerikanische Fußball	American football
der Fußball	football/soccer

Important verbs

Verb tables below

• Sein
• Haben
• Modal verbs
• Regular verbs

Other Verbs

• gehen to go
• machen to do
• brauchen- to need
• essen- to eat
• heissen- to be called (as in, "her name is"; "sie heisst Claudia...")
• wissen- to know (knowledge, information)
• kennen- to know (acquaintance)

Assignments

To help you get acquainted with the written language, use this subpage to get in contact with German speaking Wikiversity participants.

Active participants

• Exorcist_bob
• MjVP13
• Daniel M. Roberts
• HappyCamper
• --Smithgrrl 02:38, 5 November 2006 (UTC) Ich spreche deutsch nicht besonders gut aber moechte gerne helfen, wenn ich kann!