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Welcome to Jennie’s German Language Classroom For English Speakers
Come on in! When I was first learning German I was utterly confused. I kept on thinking, if I were designing this course, I would do things differently. Well, now I have my chance. You, with your hand up — do you have a question?
No, we do not use the Berlitz Method here. The greatest advantage to the Berlitz Method, also called Example And Practice, is you can mix people together regardless of their mother language. You can have French speakers, Czech speakers, Italian speakers, all mixed together in one classroom, and somehow it all works. I’m concentrating just on one group of students here, which is why it’s called Jennie’s German Language Classroom For English Speakers. I can better meet the needs of this one group if I concentrate just on us.
I see another hand over there — there are plenty of seats in the front, come take one of these — what do you need? No, we don’t use the helical learning style here. For those of you who don’t know, the helical learning style consists of a lesson focusing on, for example, adjectives; then the next lesson on word order perhaps, and then when we’ve covered each topic a little bit, make the rounds once again, this time at a more advanced level. But we don’t do that here. Rather, I cover a topic as deeply as I can the first time.
So what does it mean to learn German, or any other language? There are 4 paths of communication to consider. The first is writing — being able to put pen to paper and write reasonably grammatically correct sentences. The second, the converse of the first, is reading of course. The third is speaking, and the fourth is listening with understanding. Most of you will find some paths to be easier than others; for me, listening was the hardest. Whatever is the hardest for you will be the one you must put the most effort into.
And if you finish this course, will you be a fluent German speaker? Not even close. At some point you will have to find a real German speaker and engage in some live communication. A course like this one is just a starting point.
Now I have a question for you guys — how many of you don’t know any German at all? One, two, three — I see three hands up. We can fix that. Right now. Remember who you are.
I’m going to write a German word here on the board, one letter at a time. Here is a “B”. Note that it is a capital letter; because it’s a noun, and in German all nouns are capitalized. It’s pronounced the same as in English, as a b sound, like the b in box.
(We use this color to show how to pronounce a word. For the pronunciation guide, click here, here, and here.)
Now we have an a, which is pronounced like a in father or o in hot.
Next is an h, which in this case is silent. How do we pronounce that? (No one says anything.) Right.
And an n, which is the same as in English; like n in corn. So far, we have box·hot·corn. That’s the first syllable.
Moving on, we next have another h, but this one IS pronounced. It’s the same as in most English words; like the h in hard.
Following that is an o, sounding like the word owe.
And we finish up with an f which is spoken like the f in — well as in finish up.
The whole word is box·hot·corn–hard·howe·finished (Bahnhof). It means train station.
Now there’s a saying in German — verstehen nur Bahnhof fur–shut·day–hen nerd box·hot·corn–hard·howe·finished. It refers to a new immigrant, who wants to stay in Germany but doesn’t speak the language. It’s a mild insult, like saying in the USA 100 years ago that someone was fresh off the boat. Verstehen nur Bahnhof means the person understands just one word — Bahnhof, meaning train station. Those of you who raised their hands before — congratulations. Now you only understand train station. (Class giggles.)
But this is only the beginning of our journey. Click the first link below and we’ll learn about German consonants.
Lesson 1 — Consonants
Lesson 2 — Vowels
Lesson 3 — Common words
Lesson 4 — Gender
Lesson 5 — Nouns
Lesson 6 — Case and declension
Lesson 7 — Pronouns
Lesson 8 — Verbs
Lesson 9 — Verb families
Lesson 10 — Past tense
Lesson 11 — Motion, direction, and location
Lesson 12 — Negation
Lesson 13 — Numbers
Lesson 14 — Time, temperature, and phone numbers
