First of all I would like to mention that German is my native language, therefore you can rely on the correctness of the information you will find here. The primary objective of my German lessons will be to give you a brief insight into the basic of German grammar and to help you to improve your reading skills. It is not my objective to make you become fluent, but if you do the exercises I will provide here, it will be much easier for you to make quick progress when you register for an official language course at your local university or language school. Nevertheless these lessons will help you t
Another thing I would like to mention is that I won't explain the phonology. If you don't know how to pronounce German, you will find plenty of information in Wikipedia and on youtube.
Lesson 1
1.1 Personal pronouns (nominative)
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ich I
du you (sg.)
er he
sie she
es it
wir we
ihr you (pl.)
sie they (pl.)
Sie you (formal sg. and plural)
"sie hat" ("she has") vs. "sie haben" ("they have")
If you write "Sie" with a capitalized "s", then it's a formal "you". The formal "Sie" can be used to address one person or several people. The following tables contains a little comparison between the 2nd person pronouns of German, French and Spanish to make it easier for you to understand the differences:
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German:
inf. formal
sing du Sie
plur ihr Sie
French:
inf. formal
sing tu vous
plur vous vous
European Spanish:
inf. formal
sing tú usted
plur vosotros ustedes
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ich bin I am
du bist you are (sg.)
er
sie ist he/she/it is
es
wir sind we are
ihr seid you are (pl.)
sie sind they are
Sie sind you are (formal)
German has definite and indefinite articles. In the nominative, the definite articles are "der" (for maskuline nouns), "die" (for feminine nouns) and "das" (for neuter nouns).
For most nouns the gender is not predictable and therefore it must be learned by heart. However, there are some derivational suffixes which reveal the gender of the noun, but we will talk about these suffixes later. The indefinite articles are "ein" for masculine and neuter nouns and "eine" for feminine nouns. The definite article in the plural is "die" for all three genders. Like in English, there is no indefinite article in the plural.
Examples:
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Singular Plural English
(definite, indefinite) (definite, indefinite)
masc. der Mann, ein Mann die Männer, Männer man
der Junge, ein Junge die Jungen, Jungen boy
der Vater, ein Vater die Väter, Väter father
der Sohn, ein Sohn, die Söhne, Söhne son
der Bruder, ein Bruder die Brüder, Brüder brother
der Hund, ein Hund die Hunde, Hunde dogs
der Tisch, ein Tisch die Tische, Tische table (furniture)
der Stuhl, ein Stuhl die Stühle, Stühle chair
fem. die Frau, eine Frau die Frauen, Frauen women
die Dame, eine Dame die Damen, Damen lady
die Mutter, eine Mutter die Mütter, Mütter mother
die Tochter, eine Tochter die Töchter, Töchter daughter
die Wohnung, eine Wohnung die Wohnungen, Wohnungen appartment
die Schule, eine Schule die Schulen, Schulen school
die Zeit, eine Zeit die Zeiten, Zeiten time
die Liebe, eine Liebe --- love
neut. das Kind, ein Kind die Kinder, Kinder child
das Mädchen, ein Mädchen die Mädchen, Mädchen girl
das Auto, ein Auto die Autos, Autos car
das Haus, ein Haus die Häuser, Häuser house
das Fenster, ein Fenster die Fenster, Fenster window
das Loch, ein Loch die Löcher, Löcher hole
das Fahrrad, ein Fahrrad die Fahrräder, Fahrräder bicycle
das Land, ein Land die Länder, Länder country
As you surely have noticed, German has many different ways of forming plurals of nouns. There are many different suffixes like <-e>, <-en>, <-er>, <-s>, <-Ø> and frequently you also have to "umlaut" the stem (a o u au > ä ö ü äu).
Of course there are a lot of "rules" which you could learn by heart in order to be able to predict the plural form of each noun (like for example masculine nouns often end in "-e", feminine nouns often end in "-en", neuter nouns often end in "-er" etc.), but there are so many exceptions that I would rather advise you to simply learn the plural forms by heart. However, there is no need to worry: Language learners of German make many mistakes, but wrong plural forms are quite rare compared to other types of mistakes like choosing incorrect articles, for example. Some German learners even told me that they quickly developed a "feeling" how to form plurals in German, or in other words, instead of memorizing tons of rules, they learned the rules incidentally. So my personal theory is: As soon as you know the plural forms of maybe 100 words, you won't have any trouble with the rest anymore, you will be even capable of guessing the plural forms of words you have never heard before.
1.5 Syntax
The standard word oder in main clauses is SVO and V2. V2 means that the finite verb must always be at the second position of the sentence, no matter which syntactic constituent takes the first position. However, if the first position is not the subject NP, then the first position is somewhat topicalized. You can see this in the following example sentence:
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1 2=V 3 4 5 6
Ich gebe dir morgen in der Schule das Buch.
I give you tomorrow in the school the book.
"Tomorrow I will give you the book at school."
Alternative constructions:
Position 1 V=2 Rest
(1) Morgen gebe ich dir in der Schule das Buch. (= What am I going to do tomorrow?)
(2) Das Buch gebe ich dir morgen in der Schule. (= What am I going to give you tomorrow?)
(3) Dir gebe ich morgen in der Schule das Buch. (= To whom am I going to give the book?)
(4) In der Schule gebe ich dir morgen das Buch. (= Where am I going to give you the book?)
Y/N-questions are formed by placing the finite verb at the beginning of the sentence:
(1) Das ist Herr Schmidt. (This is Mr. Schmidt.) > Ist das Herr Schmitt? (Is this Mr. Schmidt?)
(2) Das ist Frau Müller. (This is Mrs. Müller.) > Ist das Frau Müller? (Is this Mrs. Müller?)
(3) Die Hunde sind hier. (The dogs are here.) > Sind die Hunde hier? (Are the dogs here?)
(4) Die Katzen sind dort. (The cats are over there.) > Sind die Katzen dort? (Are the cats over there?)
Unlike English, you can also place non-auxiliary verbs at the beginning of the sentence:
(5) Liebst du mich? (Do you love me?)
(6) Besuchst du mich morgen? (Are you going to visit me tomorrow?)
1.7 Some conjunctions
"und" (and), "aber" (but), "oder" (or)
Das sind Herr und Frau Meier. (These are Mr. and Mrs. Meier.)
Der Tisch ist hier, aber der Stuhl ist dort. (The table is here, but the chair is over there.)
Ist das ein Junge oder ein Mädchen? (Is this a boy or a girl?)
1.8 Predicative adjectives
Not everything about German is difficult. The good news about adjectives is that predicative adjectives do not agree with the noun they refer to, just as in English:
Some frequent adjectives:
arm (poor) - reich (rich)
hoch (high) - tief (deep)
schnell (fast) - langsam (slow)
heiß (hot) - warm (warm) - kalt (cold)
schön (beautiful) - hässlich (ugly)
klug, schlau (smart, clever) - dumm, blöd (stupid, dumb)
fröhlich, glücklich (happy) - traurig (sad)
groß (big, tall) - klein (small)
alt (old) - jung (young), neu (new)
schwarz (black), weiß (white), grau (grey), braun (brown), rot (red), gelb (yellow), blau (blue), grün (green)
kurz (short), lang (long)
schwer (heavy), leicht (light)
schwer/schwierig (difficult), leicht/einfach (easy) (light)
Some modifying adverbs:
sehr (very), zu (too), ziemlich (pretty), ein bißchen (a little)
Example sentences:
Er ist zu langsam. - He is too slow.
Ist das Mädchen schön? - Is the woman pretty?
Die Männer sind ziemlich alt. - The men are pretty old.
Die Töchter sind ein bisschen zu schlau. - The daughters are a little too smart.
Ist das Auto sehr schnell? - Is the car very fast?
Exercises
Translate from German to English
(1) Ist das ein Mann?
(2) Das sind Hunde und Katzen.
(3) Das sind die Frauen.
(4) Sind das Bücher?
(5) Das ist eine Schule.
(6) Bist du Michael?
(7) Ich bin Sebastian.
(8) Ist das das eine Frau oder ein Mann?
(9) Sind wir in Deutschland?
(10) Ist sie schön oder hässlich?
(11) Der Sohn ist ziemlich groß.
(12) Die Töchter sind sehr jung.
(13) Das Auto ist ein bisschen zu klein, aber sehr schnell.
(14) Die Brüder sind sehr traurig.
(15) Der Tisch ist rot.
(16) Klein, aber fein! (very frequent idiomatic expression)
(17) Ist das Buch sehr schwierig?
(18) Die Tische sind zu schwer.
(19) Hier ist die Mutter und dort ist der Vater.
(20) Dort sind die Männer und die Frauen.
Translate from English to German
(1) Is the dog happy?
(2) The sons are here.
(3) The cars are too slow.
(4) The men are pretty old.
(5) Mrs. Schmidt is a little stupid.
(6) Are the books red?
(7) Is he very rich?
(8) The child is a little too heavy.
(9) Is the car blue?
(10) Are you the mother?
(11) Is German difficult?
(12) The tables are new, but the chairs are old.
(13) The sons are rich, but ugly.
(14) The daughters are poor, but pretty.
(15) Are the girls young and pretty?
(16) Is the chair light or heavy?
(17) You are too young.
(18) Is the window over there?.
(19) Here is a book.
(20) Are they in Berlin?
Translate from English to German
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Peter kauft morgen einen neuen Hut.
(Peter buys tomorrow a new hat)
"Peter is going to buy a new hat tomorrow."
(1) Peter is going to buy a new hat tomorrow (topic: tomorrow).
(2) Peter is going to buy a new hat tomorrow (topic: a new hat).
; Advanced: 
; Intermediate: 
; Lower intermediate: 
; Beginner: 
