German Made Simple: A Complete Course for Serious Learners

This lecture covers typical German greetings, how to introduce yourself, and a guided dialogue to practice asking where someone comes from, where they live, and what languages they speak.

Discover the German alphabet of 26 letters, four special letters, and essential pronunciation rules, including v as f, w as v, z as ts, plus diphthongs and common letter combinations.

Learn the German personal pronouns: ich, du, er, sie, es, wir, ihr, sie, and the formal Sie, with notes on formal versus informal usage.

Master formal and informal German speech by learning when to use Sie versus du, with examples like how to ask names, ages, professions, and origins, and tips to avoid offense.

Conjugate German verbs in the present by splitting the infinitive into stem and ending, adding subject endings, and using a buffer e for easier pronunciation, with regular and irregular examples.

Explore the irregular German verb sprechen, including stem and ending changes, with conjugations ich spreche, du sprichst, er spricht, wir sprechen, ihr sprecht, sie sprechen.

Learn how German word order places the verb in the second position, and how this rule applies to W questions and yes-no questions, with practical examples.

Learn to say where you live and where you come from, and name the languages you speak, with examples of countries and languages in German.

Learn the German numbers from one to twenty. Preview the numbers from twenty-one to one hundred in the next section.

Develop listening and writing skills through a dictation exercise. Listen at normal speed, write what you hear, then slow down to write accurately and compare work with the on-screen transcription.

Learn essential family, hobbies, and interests vocabulary in German, with examples of relatives, ages, jobs, and activities like football, music, reading, surfing the internet, and cooking.

Learn to conjugate sein, the essential German verb, covering stem changes and endings, with practical examples like ich bin, du bist, er/sie/es ist, wir sind, and ihr seid.

Explore irregular German verbs lesen and sehen and their unique conjugation patterns, as you and he forms diverge from the usual rules, and prepare for possessive pronouns next.

Explore the singular possessive pronouns my, your, his, and her, noting masculine and neuter share one form while feminine and plural share another, with examples using mind, name, and hobby.

Explore counting in German from 20 to 100, noting the -iji ending is usually pronounced eesh and the 'one and twenty' counting style, with examples through the tens and hundreds.

Learn how to express likes and dislikes in German by adding gern after the verb to say you like doing something, and nicht after the verb to say you don't.

learn to negate verbs in German by placing nicht right after the verb, with examples showing negation in statements about living in Berlin and liking music.

Practice German dictation with a guided listening and writing exercise, featuring normal and slow speeds and on-screen transcription to learn punkt and comma.

Learn essential city vocabulary in German, including cafe, bank, museum, post office, restaurant, train station, and pharmacy, and practice asking about opening hours, entrance fee, and what's around here.

Learn der, die, das and ein, eine, ein, and how German noun gender—masculine, feminine, neuter—affects meaning. Use color coding—blue for masculine, red for feminine, green for neuter—to memorize possessive pronouns.

Review the singular possessive pronouns and present the plural forms for masculine, neuter, feminine, and plural, including the formal you, with examples.

The lesson explains negating nouns in German using kein before the noun, with 'Kind' for masculine and neutral nouns and 'Kynan' for feminine and plural nouns, illustrated by examples.

Explore how the accusative case works in German and how masculine articles change to den, while feminine and neuter forms stay the same, with examples and negation.

Learn haben, the irregular German verb meaning to have, and its conjugation across ich, du, er, wir, ihr, sie, with its use in the accusative case.

Learn to read opening times and days in German, use prepositions for days and the weekend, and master 24-hour time and basic German word order through examples.

Participate in a dictation exercise that moves from listening to writing what you hear, then correcting at slower and normal speeds, and comparing with the transcription, noting punctuation like punkt.

Learn to order food and drinks in German through a practical dialogue, including finding an Italian restaurant, asking for the menu, choosing vegetarian lasagna or spaghetti, and paying.

Learn essential German menu vocabulary across drinks, appetizers, main dishes, and desserts, including coffee, mineral water, Wienerschnitzel, roast beef, risotto, chocolate cake, and ice cream.

Learn how German adjectives agree with gender, number, and case when placed before a noun in the accusative, and how endings differ for indefinite and definite articles.

Master the German verb möchte, meaning would like, to politely express a wish when ordering food or drinks, and learn its conjugation and the two usage patterns.

Explore the German verbs nehmen and essen, covering present tense conjugation, irregular forms, and umlaut vowel changes, with a preview of können.

Explore the German modal verb können, its conjugation, and how it expresses likelihood, ability, permission, or obligation. Learn how modal verbs pair with a second verb and trigger inversion.

Learn German plural formation by nouns and gender; articles share the same plural across genders. Many nouns take -s, -e, -en, or -er, with vowel changes and exceptions.

Discover the past tense forms of haben and sein in präteritum with clear examples. See how German lacks a progressive tense and how ich hatte and du hattest appear.

practice dictation by listening at normal speed, then slower reading to write what you hear, followed by normal-speed reading to correct, and finally compare with the on-screen transcription.

Learn vocabulary and grammar to describe a typical day in German, including separable verbs, daily routines from waking up to bedtime, office, lunch, meetings, shopping, and evening activities.

Learn how to tell the time in German, including common phrases for asking what time it is, expressions for hours and minutes, and using the 24-hour clock or military time.

Master the accusative with German personal pronouns through practical examples like he asks me and I can see him. Practice includes singular and plural forms and the formal you.

Learn how to form the German past perfect with haben and the past participle, including regular and irregular forms, placement at sentence end, and usage vs English past perfect.

Explore irregular verbs in the German past tense, including ge- past participles ending in -en, stem vowel changes, and movement verbs that use sein.

German separable verbs move the prefix to the end in the present tense and keep the particle between the prefix and stem, in the past tense, as shown with examples.

Explore the past tense version of a typical day by examining verb forms through a detailed narrative, and learn to describe daily activities in present and past tense.

Learn to negate past tense verbs in German by placing the negation before the past participle, with multiple example dialogues and speaking practice.

Engage in a structured dictation exercise that guides you from listening at normal speed to writing, then slows for correction and final comparison with on-screen transcription, mastering German punctuation.

Explore weather vocabulary across the four seasons, with phrases for warm, hot, cool, and cold, plus conditions like sunny, rainy, windy, foggy, and talking about the temperature.

Learn to buy a train ticket, ask for price and class, choose direct options, reserve seats, and ask about departure track using essential German travel phrases.

Master the German modal verb wollen and its conjugation, with the second verb at the end and examples of separable verbs. Explore polite usage and practical phrases.

Explore German direction prepositions: use nach for cities and continents and for countries without articles; use in with the accusative for countries with articles, including United States and Philippines.

Learn how German uses dass and weil to connect sentences, placing the verb at the end, with the perfect tense affecting word order, and the dative case introduced next.

Explore the German dative case, identifying the indirect object, definite and indefinite articles in the dative, and common verbs and prepositions that govern it.

Learn to distinguish movement from location in German using in with accusative for movement and in with dative for location, noting how noun gender affects the form.

Learn the names of the months in German and how to say dates using the preposition in, with examples like in December and in March, followed by speaking practice.

Engage in a structured German dictation exercise that alternates listening at normal and slower speeds, then compares your writing to a displayed transcription, highlighting punkt and comma.

Learn how to make a doctor's appointment in German using key words and phrases. Practice the dialogue, bring your insurance card, and learn the German names of body parts.

Explore German body parts and practice saying that something hurts using the separable verb with dative, with example 'mein Kopf tut weh'.

Learn to arrange a meeting with friends in German, practice inviting others to the movies, discuss weekends and meeting places, and introduce the modal verb must have to.

Learn how müssen expresses obligation as the German 'must' modal verb, including its conjugation, the end-position rule for the second verb, and the time-before-location word order with practical examples.

Explore German dative personal pronouns and their use, compare them with accusative forms, and learn how giving and receiving affects pronoun choice through example sentences.

Learn how verbs take both dative and accusative objects in German, forming sentences with a dative recipient and an accusative thing, illustrated by give, bring, and write examples.

Learn to read German dates in day-month-year order, form ordinal numbers from one to thirty-one with -te and -ste, and use the preposition on with dates.

Learn more German prepositions that trigger the dative case, with practical examples using from, to, by, and with phrases like from Alexanderplatz to the university and to the post office.

Practice a step-by-step dictation exercise: listen at normal speed, write what you hear, then slow down to refine your transcription and note punctuation cues like punkt for periods.

Listen to German radio or TV and read German newspapers or magazines, starting with small extracts, review them, look up words, and practice with native speakers.