German for Beginners – Best tips for German Language Learning 

The German language, Deutsch, is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is also a co-official language of Luxembourg, Belgium and parts of southwestern Poland, as well as a national language in Namibia. German is the second most widely spoken Germanic language after English. German is also widely taught as a foreign language, especially in Europe, where it is the third-most taught foreign language after English and French, and the United States. One of the major languages of the world, German is a native language to almost 100 million people worldwide and is spoken by a total of over 130 million people. It is the most spoken native language within the European Union.

1. Create a study plan for yourself and set short and long term goals that are clear, realistic and measurable.

You can’t learn German overnight. But planning well in advance makes your journey easier. The study plan also helps you to monitor your performance and manage your available time. Divide the entire study content into smaller chunks to learn step by step, create a list of all the topics you want to master and figure out when and how you want to start with each one. Avoid being overambitious. Do not stress or burn yourself out with pressure. Have complete clarity about your personal goals and why you are learning German. Get them written on a plaque and ensure to place this at a place you see the most in your home, near the clock for example.

2. Make time for a regular study schedule to improve your German

There will be some days of low energy with no interest in studying as compared to some days where you are enthusiastic and full of energy you can study vocabulary and grammar for hours. In reality, it is critical to research on a regular basis. Every day, try to learn German in shorter bursts but more often. You can click via German grammar lessons – online and for free – at deutsch-lernen.com/learn-german-online/. For example, you could do one lesson and the exercises every day. If you study German for one hour a day instead of five hours once a week, your language skills can develop faster.

3. Avoid all possible disruptive factors when learning

Ensure you have no distractions around you to disturb you. Turn off your phone and let your friends know that you are not available for the next hour. Even though it may sound a little rude, eventually you will realise the importance and see that your study sessions become more efficient.

4. Make it a habit to learn German words with their correct article

Articles are very popular in German, as you’ve probably heard. As a result, always consider the right article when studying vocabulary. It’s “das Haus” rather than just “Haus” (English: home). That will save you a lot of time later if you do it right from the start. I’d also suggest learning the plural form right away. That would be “das Haus” and “die Häuser” in this instance. (The English equivalents are “the home” and “the houses.”)

5. Create some helpful study tools for yourself 

Start to write a journal or a diary so that you can capture the new words and phrases that you hear being used in day to day conversations. This will also help you build your vocabulary or important phrases that would further enable you to hold your first conversation with a German speaker. 

Label all the objects in your home with their respective German words so that you do not have to translate the name of the object in your native language before you can get to its respective German name. This will ensure that you are able to think of situations and objects in the German language itself.  

Sometimes no matter how much we learn certain things, phrases or words from the vocabulary, we are just unable to memorise them. This can be best accomplished by using Mnemonics. 

I also recommend you to use spaced repetition system apps such as Memrise, Anki. You could choose to use the existing Flashcards in the German language or make your own decks. 

You can use a post-it or a large poster for that. Now, place this magic list all over your apartment. Choose places where you spend a lot of time like: next to the coffee machine, above the stove, on the toilet or on your mirror. Whenever you are at one of these places, you will automatically have a look at the list and will be surprised how well it works.

Visual learners could actually sketch around something relevant to the word learnt so that it gives them an approximate reference to know what that word stands for. In order to learn all the parts of the speech, A learner could actually colour code them so as to make each word stand out on its own and be recognised with its colour code. For example

Nouns – blue

Verbs – red

Adjectives – green

6. Students are used to highlighting texts from school days in the textbooks.

The same can be applied in the case of vocabulary, words or phrases, conversation fillers or connectors and commonly used flow words that will be able to to help a learner make his or her conversation with the German speaker smoother, by highlighting all relevant and important information can be seen immediately seen at the first glance.

7. Indulge in entertainment in between learning

Intensive learning of any language wood leave a learner exhausted hence we recommend not to reach a Burnout stage and incorporate small pieces of entertainment such as listening to songs, watching movies, listening to radio, podcasts, audible stories in German, watching TV shows etcetera.

8. Do not underestimate the value of textbooks and learning grammar.

Learners must never ignore learning from textbooks or avoid grammar for the sake of improving their spoken German. This would be best required to improve comprehension skills in German and also to practice reading and writing the German language.

9. I am sure you have conversation partners not only to speak German with but also to get corrected.

Learners of the German language argue that they may have teachers and students in the class to talk with, however, I would still suggest you have a Constant Conversation partner with you who can help you improve your spoken German why being available at a time when you are studying and need help. You could ask them for feedback on your speech and accent and learn the way a street German is spoken by a native. They can also help you to correct your writing if you were to show your articles written in German for receiving feedback.

10. Do remember as a learner you are bound to make multiple mistakes.

Let the thought of making mistakes will not deter you from attempting to speak, write or read. However, I suggest you turn around, and use that feedback to improve your German

11. Do pat your back, give yourself some credit for accomplishment after every satisfactory German session

After every German learning session that you completed satisfactorily do go ahead and reward yourself with a chocolate, a cup of strong coffee, your favourite food, drink or a well-deserved nap on the couch. Be proud of your performance, even if you achieved a little less on one day than on the other. Every study session is associated with something good in your subconscious, and celebrating achievement will further seal the deal to keep you going on.

The German-speaking countries are ranked fifth in terms of annual publication of new books, with one tenth of all books (including e-books) in the world being published in German. The language has been influential in the fields of science and technology, where it is the second most commonly used scientific language and among the most widely used languages on websites.  The majority of its vocabulary derives from the ancient Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family, while a smaller share is partly derived from Latin and Greek, along with fewer words borrowed from French and Modern English. Modern Standard German is a West Germanic language in the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages.  

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