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A2

German A2: Basics

Time arrives at this level. You can report what happened and announce what you mean to do. Sentences get longer because they join up: the first linking words — and, but, because, when — come into play.

The vocabulary covers daily life — work, housing, travel, health, weather. Anything unfamiliar is still hard, anything familiar runs smoothly.

Tenses and the subjunctive6

Tenses

5
A2The futureGerman usually says the future in the present tense, and keeps werden for prediction and emphasis.A2What the present tense coversNow, always, tomorrow and since when — all of it in one form.A2haben or sein in the perfectMost verbs take haben; motion and change of state take sein, and a direct object always means haben.A2Saying when: seit, vor, in, fürFour prepositions of time whose English equivalents cross over, plus the tense German uses with each.A2Building the past participleThree patterns, two cases without ge-, and one where it moves inside.

The subjunctive

1
A2Polite requests: könnten, hättenA handful of subjunctive forms carry almost all German politeness, and they are met long before the grammar is.

Verbs: forms, modals, passive5

The verb: present tense and stem

3
A2Strong verbsAbout two hundred verbs change their stem vowel — and they change it in patterns English speakers already own.A2The imperativeThree forms for three ways of saying you — and a particle that turns an order into an offer.A2Inseparable verbs: be-, ver-Eight unstressed prefixes that stay attached and take no ge- in the participle.

Modal verbs

2
A2nicht müssen vs. nicht dürfenThe one place where a negation flips the meaning — and German and English flip it differently.A2sollen: orders and hearsayAn obligation that comes from another person, and a second use that reports what people say.

Cases, nouns and articles16

The four cases

1
A2Verbs that take the dativeA short list of verbs whose only object is dative, where English would use a plain object.

Nouns: gender, plural, compounds

3
A2Compound nounsRead the last part to know what it is, the parts before it to know which one.A2Diminutives: -chen and -leinTwo endings that shrink a noun, turn it neuter and sometimes change its meaning entirely.A2Guessing the gender from the endingAbout a dozen endings decide the gender outright, which covers a large share of the vocabulary.

Articles

2
A2Leaving out the articleJobs, nationalities, materials and abstract nouns often stand bare where English needs a or the.A2Demonstratives: dieser, derGerman points with dieser — and mostly with a stressed der, which is what speakers actually say.

Pronouns

3
A2Reflexive pronounsA large group of German verbs carries a pronoun that translates into nothing at all.A2Indefinite pronouns: jemandA small set of pronouns for unspecified people and things, and the endings some of them still carry.A2Question words: wer, wen, wemwer changes for case exactly like der, and two different words ask which.

Prepositions

4
A2Two-way prepositions: in, aufDative for a position, accusative for a movement — one question that settles all nine.A2Going somewhere: nach, zu, in, aufFour prepositions for a destination, chosen by what kind of place it is.A2Being somewhere: in, an, auf, beiFour prepositions for a location, and the one German uses where English says "at somebody’s".A2Coming from: aus and vonaus if you were inside it, von if you were merely at it — the mirror image of in and zu.

Adjectives

3
A2Comparative and superlativeGerman has no "more interesting" — every adjective takes the ending, however long it is.A2Comparing things: so wie, alsEquality takes wie, difference takes als, and mixing them is the commonest mistake German speakers make too.A2Adjectives as adverbsThe same word describes a thing and an action, with no -ly and no ending at all.

Sentence structure8

Word order

2
A2Middle field: known before newNot free, but ordered by a principle rather than by a slot: known things early, new things late.A2The first position (Vorfeld)Exactly one element goes in front of the verb — and which one you choose is a decision, not a formality.

Subordinate clauses

3
A2dass, weil, wenn: verb at the endThe three commonest conjunctions, and the one position they all produce.A2When: als, wenn, wannThree words English writes as "when", separated by one question: once in the past, or repeatedly?A2Giving a reason: weil, da, dennThree words for because, and each one puts the verb somewhere different.

Negation

3
A2Where nicht standsLate for the whole sentence, directly in front of one word to deny only that.A2Answering with dochGerman has a third answer word that English lacks entirely, and leaving it out is genuinely ambiguous.A2Not yet, no longer: noch nichtFour small words that place a negation in time — and each has an exact opposite.

Style and fine points1

Fine points and style

1
A2Formal and informal: du, SieGerman makes you choose a level of formality in every single sentence you address to somebody.

Word lists at level A2

Lists: 8 · words: 392

Reading texts at level A2

Sentences from this level’s topics

Er hat mir sehr geholfen.He helped me a great deal.

Der Autoschlüssel liegt in der Küche.The car key is in the kitchen.

Wir haben ein Häuschen am See.We have a little house by the lake.

Die Rechnung liegt auf dem Tisch.The bill is on the table.

Practise level A2 only