The 4 German Cases & Adjective Declension

The nominative is the basic form that marks the subject of a sentence, with the verb conjugated to the subject. Test nominatives by asking who or what is doing something.

Explore how the nominative marks the subject and certain verbs that always take nominative, like to be and to become, and when prepositions change the case.

Explore nominative declension by examining how definite and indefinite articles, pronouns, and possessive forms behave with masculine, feminine, neutral, and plural nouns.

Explore how the nominative marks the subject in German, after the verb to be, with examples using indefinite articles and possessive pronouns in the nominative.

Explore the accusative in German, the second case after the nominative, showing how masculine der becomes den and ein becomes einen, while feminine, neutral, and plural forms stay the same.

Learn how possessive pronouns in the accusative follow the same endings as the indefinite article, with masculine adding an n, neutral unchanged, and feminine/plural taking an e, plus examples.

Explore how personal pronouns decline in the accusative, compare them with possessive pronouns, and learn the singular and plural forms, including the formal Sie, through examples.

Learn when the accusative marks the direct object—the thing affected by the subject—with examples like the dog, apple, car, and chocolate, and how to identify it by 'whom or what'.

Discover verbs that take the accusative exclusively, and learn to spot them with examples like essen, nehmen, sehen, haben, backen, and anrufen.

Explore common German accusative prepositions such as durch, für, gegen, um, bis, and the rules that they govern the accusative; learn memory tricks and note case-changing combinations.

Master the accusative through many examples, focusing on the direct object, verbs that require it, pronoun forms, and common prepositions like für, gegen, um, bis.

Explore the dative declension, the stronger German case that changes articles and pronouns across genders and plural, enabling smoother conversation with proper endings.

Explore possessive pronouns in the dative, based on the indefinite article endings, with masculine and neuter em, feminine er, and plural en, illustrated with examples.

learn how personal pronouns change in the dative, with nominative reference points and endings for masculine, neutral, and feminine forms, while plural dative mirrors the accusative.

Identify when the dative marks the indirect object in German, contrasting with the accusative direct object, with examples like giving a ball to a kid.

Identify special German verbs that require the dative case. Learn how they appear in dictionaries as a verb plus de, with examples like helfen to help.

Learn the German dative prepositions that always accompany the dative case, with examples using aus, bei, mit, seit, von, and zu, and the dative article dem.

Identify the dative as the indirect object in sentences with both dative and accusative objects; learn which verbs and prepositions require the dative and practice forming dative personal pronouns.

Explore wechselpraepositionen, two-way prepositions that can take dative or accusative. Learn the rule: dative for static location, accusative for movement, with examples like on the table and onto the table.

Explore verbs that take both dative and accusative in German, such as geben and sagen, and learn three-case sentence structures with a dative recipient and an accusative object.

Learn how to express location and movement in German with dative and accusative cases using prepositions like in and nach, distinguishing cities without articles and countries with articles.

Explore how verbs combine with a preposition and a case in German, and learn to read dictionary patterns showing verb plus preposition plus case with accusative and dative examples.

Learn when to use the genitive in German, its rarity in everyday speech, its function for possession, and how to form it with names and multiple nouns.

Explore how the genitive pairs with prepositions that always take this case, including examples like during, because of, despite, and instead of.

Explore genitive declension of definite and indefinite articles, compared to other cases. Masculine and neuter nouns gain an ending; feminine and plural remain un affected.

Explore possessive pronouns in the genitive, noting that mine and yours show possession but aren’t themselves in the genitive; their genitive forms follow the same declension as indefinite pronouns.

Explain that the genitive is rarely used in everyday speech and can sound posh. Use the dative plus von construction to express possession.

Practice recaps the four German cases and adjective declension, outlining when to use nominative, accusative, dative, and genitive, with article endings, pronouns, and common prepositions.

Apply a three-step workflow to determine the case in German by checking prepositions, verbs, and sentence roles, then practice nominative, accusative, dative, and genitive usage.

Master the weak nouns of the n-declension, where masculine nouns take -en in all cases except nominative, with examples from animals, nationalities, and professions.

Learn how German adjective endings work without articles, using the zero article across plural forms, names, cities, nationalities, materials, and professions, with nominative, accusative, dative, and genitive cases.

Learn to decline adjectives in German by first identifying noun gender, choosing the article or pronoun, and selecting the case, then apply the correct adjective endings.

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