I also find it useful to write the plural of the word in a different colour (in brackets) on the post-it. It’s surprisingly fun to wizz around your house sticking post-its all over the place. Turns out it’s a masculine noun, so grab a blue post-it, write der Laptop on it and stick it to the laptop. For example, I sit at my computer for a lot of the day. Now, get on and start looking for translations to all your household objects. It’s important to be consistent here.Ī bit of gender stereotyping there but honestly it helped me to remember them. Get 3 different colour post-it notes for the 3 genders. I love this method! Post-it notes for language learning, it’s pretty straightforward. Now you’re ready to ease that noun and it’s gender into your brain, you have a few options. This is my go-to app for learning new words. is a great tool because it will give you the translation and the gender of the noun. What are the best methods for learning these pesky articles? The methods I’m about to describe I have used and still use myself and I find all of them effective in different ways.įirst of all you need to decide what noun to learn, and what it’s gender is. Right, so we understand what the basic German articles are, and why it’s important to learn them from the start. My Favourite Methods for Learning German Articles Just be aware of them, as you progress you will start noticing patterns yourself. It’s important to not get bogged down trying to remember these rules. Words ending -chen (remember das Mädchen), -lein, -um.Many but not all words ending -e ( die Katze, die Pflanze).Words ending -ung, -keit, -heit, -schaft, -ei ( die Wohnung, die Mannschaft).Compass points ( der Norden, der Westen).Days, months, seasons ( der Sommer, der Montag).The reason for this rule-breaker is the -chen ending. This isn’t always the case because we have das Mädchen (neut. For example der Mann (masc.), die Frau (fem.), das Kind (neut. ![]() People and occupations generally have the gender that is obvious. Here are a few of the more helpful and more obvious rules that I have found useful myself: I will link to a rules page if you would like to take a look: Lingoda: German articles However it would be nearly impossible to memorise each rule for each gender, as there are just so many. There are many huge lists in books and on the internet showing these rules. Now despite the maddening feeling that the genders have been randomly assigned to each noun, there are a few rules. You won’t be able to speak German correctly without having a good understanding of them and how they work.ĭon’t be intimidated, for now when you learn a new noun, learn which gender it has and which article goes with it. They dictate adjective endings and cases. Make it easier for your future self and learn the noun and the gender together.Īs frustrating as they are, the German articles are tightly woven into every aspect of the language. Trust me on this one, I learned a load of nouns for everyday objects, then later on realised I had to go back and learn the gender. ![]() However it’s really important that when you start learning, you memorise which gender each noun is assigned. It may be tempting to ignore the articles when you first start learning German. Why Should You Learn the German Articles? In this post I’m going to use the basic, nominative case to give examples of noun genders. At this stage, just bear in mind that German uses 4 grammatical cases, which will alter the article depending on the context in the sentence, don’t worry about that for now, just concentrate on the gender of each noun. It always refers to the gender of the noun.įirst of all let me introduce you to the basic articles. It changes it’s form depending on which case is used. Article = The article can be either definite (the) or indefinite (a/an).Noun gender = Each noun, object, animal, thing has an assigned gender.In this post I’m going to use a couple of terms, and I want to be totally clear from the start: Why is Bier neuter, yet Kaffee is masculine? ![]() And while there are a few rules, the choice of gender sometimes appears to be completely random. What you discover very early on into your German learning journey is that all nouns have their own gender (masculine, feminine or neuter plus the plural). The closest we get to using gendered nouns in English is referring to ships as ‘she’. There are no genders so we only use the definite article ‘the’ or the indefinite article ‘a/an’. In English, we have an easy time with nouns. If learning German articles is leaving you feeling like you’re banging your head against a wall, this post will guide you through the basics, and teach you my favourite methods of memorising each article. What are they? Why are they important? How am I supposed to remember every article for every noun? Have you just started learning German, and are wondering about the German articles?
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