This is great. I get the "what is this overly complicated sentence in German even though I just started learning German last week" question daily. Also, thanks for sharing the video I did with Jenny.
Haha mir wurde das Video gerade einfach so vorgeschlagen, ich habe es mir angeschaut und ich muss sagen, ich finde diesen Kanal spitze. Weiter so, ich wünsche dir weiterhin viel Erfolg und ich werde deine Videos anfangen aktiv zu schauen. :)
@DontTrustTheRabbit Oh my God you hit the nail on the head! "Perfect present tense" "Present Progressive" and all those other C2 English words that teachers use... It's a bit hard for me to learn a language when words are used that even as a native English speaker, makes my head spin. It's like I have to learn more of my native English language before I can learn German! I'm so glad SOMEONE gets this!
This video helped me realize I do most of the things Eric did in the video, and often find my language teacher upset though still trying to explain things. Thank you for helping me to understand some things.
As a teacher "I don´t know" is maybe the best phrase. That´s the most important moment when you come down from the stage. From that point on you work together as a team to achieve the goal.
Hallo Trixi :) Ich habe viele Videos von Dir gesehen und ich finde dich einfach super, selbstironisch bis in die Haarspitzen (auch wenn die jetzt kürzer sind, steht dir sehr gut), du bringst Humor und Sprache zusammen mit einem AHA-Effekt und sorgst für gute Laune. Danke für so viele lustige Momente, du machst das toll
Hey Trixi!! Today I started my Junior year (grade 11) and my first German class! I've previously been taking Japanese and as a student I understand these struggles a bit too much, especially reading books and getting ahead of myself. Watching this reminded me to take it slow and really gave me a burst of motivation, thank you!!
Thank you for these videos, I've always been fascinated with other languages, you are doing a good service! Also, I noticed you are humorous, and especially with your American counterpart, the lady that lives in Germany and makes videos about things to do and not to do in Germany. You were very funny with her, but I'm not sure she got your sense of humor! Keep up this wonderful work :)
I know the first thing too well. I teach German to a family from Afghanistan and the major problem is that we have no language in common. Meaning, everything I teach them I do so with pictures and using my hands and feet. However, they always want to know the meaning of every single word. But how do you describe words used for tense or pronouns? Or Teppichverlegungs- und Reinigungsdienst?? I appreciate the enthusiasm, but it makes it really difficult for me sometimes. :D
Zade Tell me about it! And it's always pretty awkward when they insist on me staying for lunch and they chat merrily with each other and all I can do is sit there and smile lol.
Das Video ist wirklich großartig :-D Die Zwischensequenzen mit der Musik und dem Bild dazu geben dem Ganzen einen mega lustigen Charakter, nur weiter so :-)
Ich finde es auch manchmal erschreckend, wieviele Deutsche einige einfache linguistische Begriffe einfach nicht kennen, wie die, die du genannt hast. Und das, obwohl man das eigentlich Jahre lang in der Schule gelernt haben sollte. Und ich kann dich in einigen Punkten sehr gut nachvollziehen, da ich teilweise Kurse in Mathe oder Physik für Schüler gebe.
If a student asks what "Teppichverlengungs- und Reinignungsdienst" means, he should be taught it. The mere fact that he remembers it and asked the question means his brain is ready to retain the expression, and readiness is key. Plus, the expression is full of ordinary vocabulary: "Teppich", "Verlegung", "Reinignung", "Dienst". He'll learn four ordinary words just because his mind remembered that one expression. And you never know what vocabulary someone will need when. I had two students learning Czech together. One was "the good little student" and stuck to the normal vocabulary and lessons. The other wanted to learn how to say all kinds of crazy things, which I went ahead and taught him. In the end, the student who wanted to learn the crazy things was also better at the ordinary things, because his brain was constantly playing with the language and forming new sentences to amuse himself, while the conventional student just "studied".
this is very encouraging. i took german all four years of high school and was able to spend my entire summer there this past summer. i LOVE german, but i'm afraid to speak it because i don't want to make mistakes. i can understand quite a bit and track with most conversations, but i have trouble getting over my fear. this video was super encouraging to me since it seems like i have many more trips to germany in my future.
Trixi, as an experienced teacher of German, here are a few reminders of things you already know, which will certainly relate to this video. First: you are in charge of the classroom, not the learner. All things which distract from the curriculum, you must be in the driver's seat and simply "amputate" them from the class. This includes complexities too much for the learner, smart-aleck questions about crude things or slang, and any other distractions which depart from the learning objectives at hand. Second: grammar and syntax should come as a result of learning to speak and write the language and not come before (or fen during) language instruction. Infants, children - and everyone learning a language - first learns it in speech, then in writing, but in their natural way of learning, they may acquire grammar and syntax years later, as part of a structure and theory that fits into and classifies the language. It is never something infants and children learn beforehand. Third: language teachers should never be afraid to say "I don't know" in front of a class. In fact, teachers in general should not be afraid to do this. Many years ago, after I had taught for years and became a 'teacher of teachers' I used to tell my student-teachers to tell their students that their teacher could not fly without wings, or walk on water. They should also say that they did not 'know it all' either - but if they were ever asked something, by a student that they did not know the answer for, they would find out and get back to them (and this should be a priority that evening). In the example you and Erick give, you need not have said "I don't know" but could have said "it depends on the situation and what you are trying o say, see me after class". Finally, languages should be taught as humans learn them - with a minimum of theory and many tons of practice. This is a middle ground between learning the language as a theory first (almost guaranteed failure) and full immersion (a fantasy, there is no such thing as full immersion when learning a foreign language). The practice should be cumulative - what you have learned before in class should be continuously learned and used in the following days, during the entire course of the 190-day school year or class curriculum. This way, students will get a "natural feeling" of how something should sound, how endings should fit, how verbs are conjugated, where things go in a sentence. And of course they will also see over this same time what does not go together, what sounds awkward, what is a wrong verb, or ending. Each of these so-called mistakes can be an opportunity for learning, just as when an infant makes a mistake in speaking within the home. They do not need to know the theory behind it, why right or wrong) they just need to know that it sounds right or wrong and have a clear, quick correction. Over time, it just becomes the natural "way it should be said".
I agree. I had a German teacher who focused SOLEY on grammar. As a student of linguistics I understand the importance of it, however, when that is the ONLY focus, it certainly makes the learning experience dull.
I agree. I had a German teacher who focused SOLEY on grammar. As a student of linguistics I understand the importance of it, however, when that is the ONLY focus, it certainly makes the learning experience dull.
Having learned a language in immersion (and also having a graduate degree in linguistics), I find that grammar and syntax, in both children and adults, are largely figured out by the subconscious after the brain does a lot of "chunking", which is acquisition of phrases and sentences that are then stored by the brain and eventually decomposed into grammar and syntax. However, the student also needs to learn the theory, because they still need to consciously monitor their correctness, to the degree they can. Once they recognize a repeated mistake, it will take about four months for them to eradicate it, but first they need to be able to recognize it.
+DontTrustTheRabbit : I absolutely LOVE your channel! The way you break things down is really helpful. Too bad you can't give me lessons and help me. I am trying desperately to learn German so I can teach my son while he's young enough to easily learn both (he just turned 4). So far, because I can't get my husband to take an interest learning, it's been a struggle. I've downloaded Duolingo, the Goethe Institute apps and changed my phone language to German. I seem to struggle with the proper ordering for the words, more than vocabulary itself. Although I still am building my vocab., the order is a nightmare for me. I want to be able to speak German fluently with my son as a child to adulthood, but I am having issues lol. TYSM for your channel! And TY for all the work you do to provide these mini 'lessons'. Best wishes! :)
3:50 :D aaaahhh.. My head is going to explode, pls stop Trixie! ^^ ... and that topic reminds me at the moment I found your old german only channel.. I had a problem in german with the "Metrum" and found your video about it which really helped me out.. time really passes by fast. :o
I guess you must do a incredible job as a german teacher😊🌸 I hope one day to learn this language and I will follow your "advice": I'm gonna learn in a calm way... not so "over". I will take and enjoy step by step😊🌺 Thanks for you video🌸
warum, wieso und weshalb haben einen Kontext und sind nicht notwendigerweise synonym wieso hat einen erklärenden Kontext, weshalb hat einen kausalen Kontext, warum hat einen philosophischen Kontext Einfach ausgedrückt: Naturwissenschaftler stellt zuerst die "welhalb"-Frage um eine Ursache zu finden und beantwortet dann die "wie" bzw. "wieso"-Frage um dies zu erklären. Den Theologen und Philosophen überlässt man dann das "warum". Weshalb dreht sich die Erde um ihre eigene Achse? Weil sie aus einer Aktkreditionsscheibe um die Sonne entstanden ist. Wieso bzw. wie dreht sich die Erde um ihre eigene Achse? Weil der Impuls der Masse aus der sie entstanden ist eine Richtung haben muss, Stichwort: Drehimpuls Warum dreht sie die Erde um ihre eigene Achse? Weil Gott es so gewollt hat, weil es die Gesetze der Physik wollen ... Die Antwort auf eine Warum-Frage lässt sich daher immer wieder mit einer "warum"-Frage Kontern - die einzigen richtigen Fragen sind "wie/wieso" oder "weshalb". In der englischen Sprache gibt es dafür "why" (warum) und "how" (wie) - dass man heute auch weshalb in der englischen Sprache einfach mit "why" verwendet ist traurig, dafür wäre "for what reason" oder ähnliches deutlich passender.
The way I differentiate "warum" and "wieso" is by thinking of "warum" as "why" and "wieso" as "how so" heck "wie + so" actually do mean "how + so" in German.
Ich weiß nicht wieso aber obwohl mein Englisch unterirdisch schau ich deine Videos wirklich gern und manchmal versteh ich sogar was. Es macht mir extrem viel Spaß dir und Erik dabei zu zuschauen wie ihr die deutsche und englische Sprache auseinander nimmt und so manches kompliziertes aufdeckt :) Macht bitte weiter so ^^
Und wenn du so weiter machst ist ein Englisch irgendwann nicht mehr unterirdisch. Das geht schneller als du denkst. Ich war bis zur 9. Klasse immer schlecht in Englisch. Aber als ich angefangen habe Computerspiele auf Englisch zu spielen und Filme, die ich gut kannte auf Englisch zu schauen wurde es innerhalb von 2 Jahren so gut, dass ich in der Oberstufe plötzlich ein 1er Schüler war.
I started taking german in September and before that I did three years of Spanish, my first language is French but I've been raised in an English society, anyways, in both german and Spanish class after a few weeks my teachers in high went straight to teaching us in the new language and we ask many questions for words we don't understand and stuff and they'll always explain in French (I've only been to French schools), it's very easy for me to get lost in class but then when I get home and get to doing the homework I figure out what the teacher had been talking about in class or I go back to a previous text and be like so that's what that meant, in other words, I find that learning a language can often be hard but I really love learning and a good teacher makes a world of difference, I hope to keep working on my German to one day be fluent
There are way worse things a theachr can say than «I don't know». Sometimes when a teacher did not know the answer, they pretended my question was irrelevant, when it was not.
For both Mr. Kirchner and Mr. Macedo. First thank you for the excellent quality of our discussion. Let me add that I agree with you both that the learning of a language consists of both its organic use by the learner and the systematisation of the language - it's grammar, syntax and structure. In my own experience over four decades old designing courses, teaching them and observing how people learn, the best way to impart a second (or greater) language to a learner is in a way as close as possible to how an infant, child or young person learns it. This complex, living process normally begins with listening, observing, imitating, repeating, their way through words, phrases, sentences, dialogue, conversation and paragraphs over weeks, months and years. During this time,the systematisation of the language happens as a natural outgrowth of language usage, as learners see and experience through actual use what proper trends exist (tenses, endings, conjugations, etc) and of course also encounter things not appropriate - things to avoid. This is definitely not to say that these processes (organic usage and systematising theory) are separate from one another, or only happen one behind the other. Normally, systematisation starts in learners soon after normal usage begins, but is almost never profitable to use as the principle backbone of language instruction. If this is done, then learners must in effect learn two "languages" - the language itself, and also the language of linguistics. There is a blending, balance between learning only usage, and learning both the usage and language theory. My words here do not adequately describe this, I am afraid. I hope you can help me clarify.
I have to argue with no. 1. When it comes to learning vocabulary our brain is capable to catch and remember all kinds of exotic words as long they are immediately connected with a unique or emotional situation. Since he has to learn "Teppich" or "Dienst" anyway, this is a good situation to give him a good and unique memory for those words.
5:44 Ehm, Eric, can you explain to me why are there so many words for “aufhören” in English? I know “to stop”, “to quit”, “to cease” and “to discontinue”. :-P
***** But only when the videos are captioned in either English or German. Spanish is just such a weird language and I have really *no* interest at all in learning it, and every time I have to hear it, it annoys me. So I'd probably watch these videos muted and read the subtitles.
+Seegal Galguntijak What a pity! I value the sound and style of the Spanish language very much and appreciated the ability to learn it in school. I like the emotion every word transports. Please give it a chance, you are missing something!
JuMixBoox To me, the emotions that are transported with the sound of the language - not unlike Italian - all feel like anger, hate and frustration, and that makes the language sound ugly in my opinion. But I guess it's a matter of personal taste, so nothing one could really argue about (like different styles of music).
Hey Trixi, I like this video very much. And jep, I also get in these situations aswell, sometimes (→ I teach French). The "funktionale Einsprachigkeit" is quite difficult to grab in class. How ever, I only try to explain the spooky grammar in German, if needed (or I let them *discover* it inductively themselves). And I only use the known vocabulary. About the "warum - weshalb - wieso" part, my advice would be to either let the student(s) research for this and then present it next time or to ask for some research time myself. Last but not least, I have a question for you: How do you embrace the quirks of your students? :D
One thing that helps me remember my vocabulary is to hear a little history about each word in addition to its meaning. Nothing too in depth - just an interesting factoid or two. And especially if it's a compound word, I like to know the meanings of its component words along with an explanation (even if only an educated guess) of how they came to be merged into a new word, often with a new meaning of its own. For example, I noticed "langeweile" begins with "lange" which I know concerns length or describes something long, and "weile" is like English "while" denoting a span of time. So I thought to myself: Hmm. In German, if I say "long while" as a single word, literally translated, I am no longer (necessarily) describing a lengthy stretch of time, but a new thought, a new mood, that corresponds with English's "boredom". And I even toyed with the thought that perhaps German speakers, long ago, simply described the feeling of boredom, regardless of its actual duration, as compared to waiting a long while for something to happen. Perhaps it began as a two-word metaphor, then later evolved into the more solid concept it defines today, as a single word. I confess I never did research that one, although more often than not I do. So I don't know the real story behind "langeweile". But the mental experiment alone was enough to help me remember it forever. Now... I did have one teacher who discouraged me from doing this. She told me I should just learn my vocabulary as presented in the textbook, without breaking words down into constituents and thus adding more work to my plate. I hated her. The End. (Just kidding) But I did defy her every step of the way. I stubbornly continued to learn words this way, and simply didn't tell her about it. I hope that's not one of your pet peeves, Trixi! Do you also prefer your students stick to a certain curriculum? Or do you encourage them to use their own mnemonics? Maybe something in between? -Phill, Las Vegas
The last point reminds me so much at my japanese classes (was studying for 4 years until this year). We often found sentences, where you should use word X instead of Y, even though it had the same meaning. When we asked the teacher, the answer was most of the time "You are correct, you could use Y here, but... it's a bit different. Just use X in this case" It's impossible to explain every sentence if your students only know the basics and ask questions about some really advanced stuff. It became some kind of a running gag for us, when she said "das ist anders"
Love no 5. The sentence structure in German really goes crazy sometimes. I attended German classes for 5 school years (20 years ago), and stuff like this is waaaay over my head :)
I understand Erick position, as a spanish speaking myself most of the time i take to learn another language, like Japanese we have to part porf english and not spanish, even when we can have very good or excellent english we are using another language in between our brain, we can go for English to the new one but sometimes the brain needs the spanish conector to understand fully some words or sentences. I have a cousin in Berlin with regular English trying to learn German fast for inclusion as a german himself but as Erick a Venezuelan new german (for a way to describe it) and he is 2 years in the process and still think only know half of what he needs. damn german is hard, but I will love for a dedicated (and nice) teacher as you are.
Verb, Nomen, Adjektiv, present simple, imparfait,... Die Ausdrücke mussten wir immer gleich zu Beginn lernen. Und zwar immer in der jeweiligen Sprache. Da mussten wir uns wohl auf die Lehrersprache einstellen. Super Video!
Well, I honestly think a teacher being able to admit that he or she simply doesn't know the answer is a good teacher. because face it, nobody knows everything. Not even a teacher who studied up to 9 terms. One does never stop learning :)
Ach Trixi...! Das ist alles so wahr! Ich arbeite selbst als eine Deutschlehrerin in Polen (also ich bin Polin und ich unterrichte Deutsch in Privatschule) und ich kenne alle diese Situationen aus eigener Erfahrung, Manchmal stellen mir meine Schüler solche unfassbare Fragen, dass ich gleichzeitig laut lachen und heulen will. Meistens fragen sie nach kleinen Einzelheiten, die sich nich wirklich erklären lassen, denn…es ist nun mal so. Oder während ihrer ersten Unterrichtsstunde wollen sie unbedingt wissen, wie man „ditch” und „truck traktor” auf deutsch sagt. (notwendiges Wissen :>) Trotzdem habe ich diese Arbeit wirklich lieb und alle meine Schüler sind einfach fantastiche Leute. Alle diese Geschichten, die sie mir erzählen und wie sie mit der Sprachblokade kämpfen, wie sie Lernschritte machen -das ist alles so wichtig für mich. Die beste Arbeit, die ich je hatte ! Und manchmal teile ich mit meinen Lieblingsschülern witzige Neuigkeiten, die ich bei dir gesehen habe :)
Are you suggesting conjugating prefix verbs is not a day one activity? I did enjoy taking spanish from a professor of spanish. But even he had to say "you just have to memorize it" on a regular basis. But he did have a lot of insight into why certain parts of spanish were weird.
I love reading all sorts of books and have been curious what books I should buy in German to get a feel for the German language. Elementary level is fine as long as I can eventually move up from it but don't want to start with something to hard and lose confidence. Any recommendations will be appreciative,thanks
I just came across this video and can relate to ALL these situations....I teach spanish to English speakers and the situations are the same!! Thanks for your videos
Und wenn man zwei Buchstaben im Wort Bier ändert, hat man KNIE. Was das jetzt wiederum zu bedeuten hat, kann uns nur ein Mitglied der Illuminaten erklären.
To #5: I think it's still worth it, do deal with too complicated things: When I heared the musical "Hair", I noticed a song, which seemed not really to fit in: "What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, ..." It gets quite elaborate further on. After I realized, that is was a citation from Shakespeare's "Hamlet", I started to read more of Shakespeare's poems. I did not understand each and every word, but I developped a feeling, how rich and beautiful English can be. I also enlarged my vocabluray that way considerably.
Yes! I happen to be an atheist, but I think everyone ought to read the Bible if for no other reason than that it will inform his or her understanding of English literature. It should be noted, however, that Shakespeare, though written in what is technically considered Modern English, contains lots of beautiful but archaic formulations and vocabulary, and thus is difficult reading even for most native English speakers.
I used to teach ESL in the US. I had 87 students in a classroom with 30 desks. We weren’t allowed to cap enrollment. Students from all parts of the world. I did my best. But the questions.... wow. No filter.
Joa mir wurde auch schon vorgeworfen, dass ich falsch liege, weil ich "größer als" anstatt "größer wie" sage. Die Hürden der Integration sind manchmal sehr witzig. x´D
Mach mal nen bisschen halb lang, du solltest nicht denken, das alle nicht besser reden können wie die die du kennst. Ich kann seid ich ein Kind war richtig deutsch und da bin ich nicht die einzigste. (....Sorry, nein, keine Panik. Ich wollte nur ein schönes Beispiel bringen mit so vielen schrecklich nervigen, aber dauernd gemachten Fehlern wie möglich :D )
Lulu S Haha, ja sehr treffend, aber zum Glück bin ich die ersten Jahre hier auf´s Gymnasium gegangen und habe solche Deutsche erst in meiner Ausbildung kennen gelernt. Ich finde es auch eher schade, dass die Bildung in den letzten Jahrzehnten so vernachlässtigt wurde in Deutschland, in einem der am meisten industrialisierten Länder der Welt mit dem größten Bedarf an Fachkräften... Darin liegt auch die Haupt-Ursache für diese katastrophalen Wahlergebnisse, sowohl in Europa, als auch in Amerika... Also ich habe mich nie "überlegen" gefühlt, habe mich nur gewundert. ;)
Love your videos. You brought an interesting point about: warum, weshalb, wie so. Funnily enough there is an explanation. Warum is why - is the most common way of asking for a reason for doing something. Wie so is how so - is also not an uncommon way of saying why but with "how is that possibile" as an implied question in mind Weshalb does not have an exact English translation but the best way to translate it would be " for what reason" and as you said it, its more common to see it in formal language than in everyday language (deshalb=for that reason) It's as difficult as to grasp as why the answer to a Warum question starts with Weil and not with Darum. Also I don't believe that using terms like verb, adjective, pronoun, preposition, plusquamperfekt, konjunktiv I, Konjunktiv II, etc. is your mistake. I'm Polish, and I've been learning foreign languages for the most of my life (English, German and Japanese). And knowing those terms is essential to understand anything. Sorry to Eric, but he's probably American and that explains his lack of knowledge (due to never before having to learn a foreign language seriously)
"Teacher's eye", absolutely true. Best way to do in that situation, I think, is to ask "ok, can you explain it to me, please?", because then they realize they didn't understand it.
Ich wünschte ich hätte jemanden, der mir Englisch beibringen könnte. Aber tolles Video, wie immer ich hoffe, dass du weiter so tolle Videos machst! Lg Patrick
I'm wondering if using childrens books, such as toddler level books that parents read to their toddlers would be good to read. I notice most, if not, all of them in English, have small and basic words.
A language serves a practical purpose. I don't need to learn all these "simple" words first if I want to translate some sentence from a book, a film or a song. I like this way of learning. I need the vocabulary I need, not what I don't. Besides, if you're good at special vocabulary then understanding of simple frequent words is easy for you. Wieso is how so(it can be used when a person is kind of surprised), warum is why, weshalb and weswegen is for what reason. gebaut worden sein koennte - could have been built gebaut worden koennte - could be built "Sein" makes the action completed. It's actually not that complicated once you understand the structure, once you're a German.
Trixi what do you think of computer programs such as 'Rosetta Stone' to learn German?? Your idea of their pros/cons and are they worth the cost?? Are there better programs??
I have an English nit. A guinea pig in English idiom usually refers to somebody being used in an experiment, where the outcome is uncertain, with implications that the person being so used may be ignorant of their role or unwilling, and the outcome may be unpleasant. It doesn't need to be really scientific; it could be something like using Erick as your makeup dummy to try new combos of foundation and blush. It comes from the use of guinea pigs in actual science experiments. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinea_pig#Scientific_research In this case Erick is acting the part of your class, as an abstract / composite. There's no experiment or surprise outcome. He's role-playing. I tried to come up with an equivalent noun. Stand-in? Straight man? Foil? (Foil: "In literature, theatre/theater, etc., a character who helps emphasize the traits of the main character.") Anyway, this nit may be of no interest to you, and I certainly don't mean that it detracted from the video AT ALL. But I appreciate your videos, and "native English speaker nit-picking" is my only currency to repay you. That and "compliments from a German learner".
I can most definitely relate to these situation as a German teacher. There might as well be a couple of scenarios that you didn't include, for instance when the student keeps asking questions making the rest of the group feel either intimidated or annoyed not to mención bored as hell hahahaha Grüße aus Mexiko, Trixie :D
The 'Teacher Language' one really resonated with me. When I was trying to learn German the teacher suddenly started talking about how a word was the something participle or the present tense continuing for was ... I'd not come across that terminology so felt really stupid. This was the early 1990s so I couldn't even Google the terms.
Sometimes you can backtrace similar words to different root words for example "tolererieren" and "dulden", basically mean the same, but the first one comes from latin and the second one is from old germanic. So instead of just saying I don't know, you can say I will look up the origins of these words. :)
Trixie I really want to learn German, I have learned alot of the basic and am a fast learner but since I have no one who speaks german...i cant practice it. Do you give online classes? And if so how much would they be? IT WOULD BE AWESOME IF YOU WERE TO TEACH ME!
Kannst du ein Video darüber machen, wie man jemandem eine Fremdsprache (Wörter und Grammatik) sytematisch beibringt? Ich würde auch gerne Englisch oder Deutsch (in der Freizeit) unterrichten, weiß aber nicht, wo ich da anfangen sollte...
I taught German for a few years. I remember the "blank stare" you get from students who claim to know things they don't when they have to respond. German isn't my first language, but I have an idea of explaining "Why:" Warum=most common, wieso=slightly less so and weshalb =formal. Don't be afraid to say "I don't know". You can always look it up.
Some thoughts... In dealing with sentence structure, look at malformed structures from the standpoint of the speaker's native language. Usually, this is easier in a written context. Once you get to the point of understanding what that other language's apparent rule is, you can more easily disassemble their language and show them the equivalent structure in the target language. Teaching a language you know, whether your native language or not, makes you go back and question your own knowledge. This is sometimes useful when searching for an answer to give to a student. I assume this is the case in German, but in English, where you have several overlapping words for the same thing, it is usually the case that each has a different connotation, or different implied meaning.
There are many philosophical concepts that the late polyglot teacher Michel Thomas and I share. One of them is to get your student to think about what it is they are trying to say. As the learner, when you feel you understand what it is you are trying to accomplish, the things which otherwise frustrate you tend to drop away. I would add to this that a multidisciplinary approach is the best suited to this and many other tasks because you can approach a problem from many different angles.
Wer, wie, was - wieso, weshalb, warum. Also, da war doch was in meiner Kindheit... hmmm. Sometimes not the answer, but the question is the wrong on. Don't ask why you have 3 words with the same meaning, but how you can use them. For example to have another word for "warum" may be usefull to avoid unwanted alliterations and improve the melody of a sentence. However, this is far beyond the goals of the first lessons.
oha!!! habe gerade realisiert: "wer nicht fragt bleibt dumm." habe ich als kind so interpretiert, dass alle kinder am anfang dumm sind und nur schlauer werden, wenn sie erwachsenen fragen stellen. wenn dem so ist würde das die herablassende haltung erwachsener gegenüber kinder ausdrücken. kann jmd diese interpretation nachvollziehen???
Russpelz ist trotzdem negativ formuliert. man könnte auch sagen "wer fragt kann was lernen" klar, in einem lied muss man auch beachten, dass der satz reinpasst, aber warum muss man überhaupt das wort "dumm" in ein kinderlied einbauen?
When you say "What does 'Do you wanted to sleep with me tonight?' mean in German?" it doesn't actually make sense in English. What you should ask is "How do you say 'Do you want to sleep with me tonight?' in German?" As an English sentence, it doesn't mean anything in German.
having alot of Synonymous is a good and a bad thing. for someone who's learning a new language it's most likely that he/she will learn one word that describes the thing so when someone else asks you using another word you will be like whaa! :) nice video
1 - Congrats on breaking the 100k subs! (old news) 2 - I suppose you've seen this already, but you could do something Totally Trixie with this idea - from BuzzF**d: 24 Products From Germany The Rest Of The World Never Asked For 3 - LOVE your channel. I'll just stop there ;)
It is definitely something, that should not concern new learners, but there is a difference between 'wieso?', 'weshalb?' and 'warum?'. While 'wieso?' originates from something like 'wie kam das so?' similar to latin 'qui sic?' and therefore asks for the source of something, 'weshalb?' comes from Middle High German 'was' + 'halben' (direction, reason) and is hence asking for the purpose. 'Warum?' finally is a hybrid form of Middle High German 'was' and 'umbe' (local preposition: for, why, etc) and so asks for the motive. Of course today they are used synonymically. I know no German native speaker who uses them this way (if not intuitively) - but I still think the etymology and former use is interesting!
Bisschen spät, aber ich muss dazu echt mal ne Anekdote bringen, weil ich das Gefühl mittlerweile nur zu gut kenne. Als ich in Japan studiert habe, habe ich auch einen Deutschkurs für Anfänger besucht (um Kontakte zu knüpfen und weil ich den Lehrer mag) und da auch das ein oder andere über Linguistik gelernt. Nun hatte ich in diesem Kurs zwei überaus ambitionierte Chinesen neben mir sitzen. Vor allem einer der beiden war relativ schnell im Lernen, aber so manches Mal haben mich die beiden mit ihren Fragen auch in den Wahnsinn getrieben. Wann immer wir etwas gelernt haben, was es in ihrer Sprache nicht gibt (und auch im Japanischen nicht, was beide fließend beherrschten und ich auch halbwegs) beugten sie sich zu mir rüber und baten um Hilfe. Manchmal ging das einigermaßen, nachdem ich irgendwie mit Händen und Füßen das nötige japanische Vokabular zusammengekratzt hatte (mein Chinesisch ist leider nicht der Rede wert und Englisch konnten die beiden nicht so gut) aber manchmal dacht ich so: Euer Ernst jetzt? Da erklärt der Lehrer also das grammatikalische Geschlecht und die Flektion und die beiden kommen wieder gefährlich nahe und fragen ganz ernst gemeint: Wie kann ich mir das merken? Und ich so völlig hilflos: ... Keine Ahnung, ich bin Muttersprachler...! Die Beiden: Ja, aber... irgendwoher musst du doch wissen, wann du was benutzt! Und ich immer verzweifelter: Ja, aber für mich ist es halt einfach logisch, weil ich es ja immer schon so benutzt habe und von meiner Familie so gehört habe. Ich hab ja nur nachgemacht, was alle anderen Deutschen gemacht haben und so die Sprache gelernt. Ende vom Lied: Unbefriedigte Gesichter, awkward silence. Da ist es dann immer von Vorteil, wenn der Fremdsprachenlehrer die gleiche Muttersprache hat wie der Schüler, denn der kann dann für ihn logische Tipps geben. Denn selbst wenn ich jetzt z.B. Französin wäre und auch nur Deutsch gelernt hätte, wäre meine Taktik wahrscheinlich für Chinesen gar nicht nachvollziehbar. x,D
There is a reason that classwork tackles these things in the first year. If you get persons, tenses, etc. out of the way, everything gets easier. Good luck to you if he's never been exposed to that. A good text would probably help.
warum=why (easy everyday use just as a question word) weshalb= for which (what) reason... The meaning is just the same as in "warum". wieso, again the same meaning just as wherefore. English also has many ways to ask or say "why".
"The eyes"... My teachers sometimes asked whether I understood and at this specific point at which they won't allowed me to lie to them I just said. "Yeah I didn't get it, but you can keep going, I'' figure it out." Your students don't know these terms? What people do/did you teach? I mean I learned the basics of that stuff in grade school.
Definitely! I think sometimes teachers can be too insistent about mastering one thing before moving on to the next. If something is a sufficiently important part of the language, you _will_ figure it out eventually, simply by being confronted by it over and over again
,all German I have know/learned has been on my own....I love it... can read more than what i hear... put more videos of where ones like me can learn the speaking...bitter, und danke
The German theme song for Sesame Street just would not be the same without wieso, weshalb and warum XD
That must be the reason :D
imagine: who, how, what, the, the the, why, why, why, who doesn't ask is stupid :D
ist es nicht: wer nicht fragt "bleibt" dumm? also stays stupid? ^^ just wondering
That's right! XD
This is great. I get the "what is this overly complicated sentence in German even though I just started learning German last week" question daily. Also, thanks for sharing the video I did with Jenny.
...and meanwhile, poor Erik still doesn't know where to go to have a carpet installed and/or cleaned.
now: Erick: "Things that annoy me as a German learner" ;p
Haha mir wurde das Video gerade einfach so vorgeschlagen, ich habe es mir angeschaut und ich muss sagen, ich finde diesen Kanal spitze. Weiter so, ich wünsche dir weiterhin viel Erfolg und ich werde deine Videos anfangen aktiv zu schauen. :)
Yay, super, das freut mich sehr! :)
Don't trust the rabbit, you should make a language learning series
F
My German teacher used to call me the devil. I was such a bad student though that I thought he was calling me "Mr. Chalkboard".
😂😂😂
Hi. I have been learning a lot about the german culture watching your videos. I like the way you explain things. Greetings from Panama.
I don't know why this appeared in my recommended list...now I'm in love.
Aww. :)
Yup.
@DontTrustTheRabbit Oh my God you hit the nail on the head! "Perfect present tense" "Present Progressive" and all those other C2 English words that teachers use... It's a bit hard for me to learn a language when words are used that even as a native English speaker, makes my head spin. It's like I have to learn more of my native English language before I can learn German!
I'm so glad SOMEONE gets this!
This video helped me realize I do most of the things Eric did in the video, and often find my language teacher upset though still trying to explain things. Thank you for helping me to understand some things.
As a teacher "I don´t know" is maybe the best phrase. That´s the most important moment when you come down from the stage. From that point on you work together as a team to achieve the goal.
I can totally relate to those challenges you face as a teacher! It can be gloriously rewarding, but also utterly frustrating!
Hallo Trixi :)
Ich habe viele Videos von Dir gesehen und ich finde dich einfach super, selbstironisch bis in die Haarspitzen (auch wenn die jetzt kürzer sind, steht dir sehr gut), du bringst Humor und Sprache zusammen mit einem AHA-Effekt und sorgst für gute Laune.
Danke für so viele lustige Momente, du machst das toll
Trixie I love all your videos and your accent!! I love studying languages and really enjoy seeing someone with the same passion!!
Hey Trixi!! Today I started my Junior year (grade 11) and my first German class! I've previously been taking Japanese and as a student I understand these struggles a bit too much, especially reading books and getting ahead of myself. Watching this reminded me to take it slow and really gave me a burst of motivation, thank you!!
Thank you for these videos, I've always been fascinated with other languages, you are doing a good service! Also, I noticed you are humorous, and especially with your American counterpart, the lady that lives in Germany and makes videos about things to do and not to do in Germany. You were very funny with her, but I'm not sure she got your sense of humor! Keep up this wonderful work :)
I know the first thing too well. I teach German to a family from Afghanistan and the major problem is that we have no language in common. Meaning, everything I teach them I do so with pictures and using my hands and feet. However, they always want to know the meaning of every single word. But how do you describe words used for tense or pronouns? Or Teppichverlegungs- und Reinigungsdienst?? I appreciate the enthusiasm, but it makes it really difficult for me sometimes. :D
Must be extremely difficult with no common language!
Zade
Tell me about it! And it's always pretty awkward when they insist on me staying for lunch and they chat merrily with each other and all I can do is sit there and smile lol.
That must be super awkward and hard to relate to. What city are you from?
Zade
Near Stuttgart/Germany, you?
Hallo , Leute ich komme aus Hamburg
This was a lovely and informative video. I am pleased to know that I'm not the only person in the world interested in how languages really work.
Das Video ist wirklich großartig :-D Die Zwischensequenzen mit der Musik und dem Bild dazu geben dem Ganzen einen mega lustigen Charakter, nur weiter so :-)
Ich finde es auch manchmal erschreckend, wieviele Deutsche einige einfache linguistische Begriffe einfach nicht kennen, wie die, die du genannt hast. Und das, obwohl man das eigentlich Jahre lang in der Schule gelernt haben sollte.
Und ich kann dich in einigen Punkten sehr gut nachvollziehen, da ich teilweise Kurse in Mathe oder Physik für Schüler gebe.
If a student asks what "Teppichverlengungs- und Reinignungsdienst" means, he should be taught it. The mere fact that he remembers it and asked the question means his brain is ready to retain the expression, and readiness is key. Plus, the expression is full of ordinary vocabulary: "Teppich", "Verlegung", "Reinignung", "Dienst". He'll learn four ordinary words just because his mind remembered that one expression. And you never know what vocabulary someone will need when.
I had two students learning Czech together. One was "the good little student" and stuck to the normal vocabulary and lessons. The other wanted to learn how to say all kinds of crazy things, which I went ahead and taught him. In the end, the student who wanted to learn the crazy things was also better at the ordinary things, because his brain was constantly playing with the language and forming new sentences to amuse himself, while the conventional student just "studied".
this is very encouraging. i took german all four years of high school and was able to spend my entire summer there this past summer. i LOVE german, but i'm afraid to speak it because i don't want to make mistakes. i can understand quite a bit and track with most conversations, but i have trouble getting over my fear. this video was super encouraging to me since it seems like i have many more trips to germany in my future.
Trixi, as an experienced teacher of German, here are a few reminders of things you already know, which will certainly relate to this video. First: you are in charge of the classroom, not the learner. All things which distract from the curriculum, you must be in the driver's seat and simply "amputate" them from the class. This includes complexities too much for the learner, smart-aleck questions about crude things or slang, and any other distractions which depart from the learning objectives at hand. Second: grammar and syntax should come as a result of learning to speak and write the language and not come before (or fen during) language instruction. Infants, children - and everyone learning a language - first learns it in speech, then in writing, but in their natural way of learning, they may acquire grammar and syntax years later, as part of a structure and theory that fits into and classifies the language. It is never something infants and children learn beforehand. Third: language teachers should never be afraid to say "I don't know" in front of a class. In fact, teachers in general should not be afraid to do this. Many years ago, after I had taught for years and became a 'teacher of teachers' I used to tell my student-teachers to tell their students that their teacher could not fly without wings, or walk on water. They should also say that they did not 'know it all' either - but if they were ever asked something, by a student that they did not know the answer for, they would find out and get back to them (and this should be a priority that evening). In the example you and Erick give, you need not have said "I don't know" but could have said "it depends on the situation and what you are trying o say, see me after class". Finally, languages should be taught as humans learn them - with a minimum of theory and many tons of practice. This is a middle ground between learning the language as a theory first (almost guaranteed failure) and full immersion (a fantasy, there is no such thing as full immersion when learning a foreign language). The practice should be cumulative - what you have learned before in class should be continuously learned and used in the following days, during the entire course of the 190-day school year or class curriculum. This way, students will get a "natural feeling" of how something should sound, how endings should fit, how verbs are conjugated, where things go in a sentence. And of course they will also see over this same time what does not go together, what sounds awkward, what is a wrong verb, or ending. Each of these so-called mistakes can be an opportunity for learning, just as when an infant makes a mistake in speaking within the home. They do not need to know the theory behind it, why right or wrong) they just need to know that it sounds right or wrong and have a clear, quick correction. Over time, it just becomes the natural "way it should be said".
Thank you very much. :)
I agree. I had a German teacher who focused SOLEY on grammar. As a student of linguistics I understand the importance of it, however, when that is the ONLY focus, it certainly makes the learning experience dull.
I agree. I had a German teacher who focused SOLEY on grammar. As a student of linguistics I understand the importance of it, however, when that is the ONLY focus, it certainly makes the learning experience dull.
Having learned a language in immersion (and also having a graduate degree in linguistics), I find that grammar and syntax, in both children and adults, are largely figured out by the subconscious after the brain does a lot of "chunking", which is acquisition of phrases and sentences that are then stored by the brain and eventually decomposed into grammar and syntax. However, the student also needs to learn the theory, because they still need to consciously monitor their correctness, to the degree they can. Once they recognize a repeated mistake, it will take about four months for them to eradicate it, but first they need to be able to recognize it.
+DontTrustTheRabbit : I absolutely LOVE your channel! The way you break things down is really helpful. Too bad you can't give me lessons and help me. I am trying desperately to learn German so I can teach my son while he's young enough to easily learn both (he just turned 4). So far, because I can't get my husband to take an interest learning, it's been a struggle. I've downloaded Duolingo, the Goethe Institute apps and changed my phone language to German. I seem to struggle with the proper ordering for the words, more than vocabulary itself. Although I still am building my vocab., the order is a nightmare for me. I want to be able to speak German fluently with my son as a child to adulthood, but I am having issues lol. TYSM for your channel! And TY for all the work you do to provide these mini 'lessons'. Best wishes! :)
3:50 :D aaaahhh.. My head is going to explode, pls stop Trixie! ^^
... and that topic reminds me at the moment I found your old german only channel.. I had a problem in german with the "Metrum" and found your video about it which really helped me out.. time really passes by fast. :o
I guess you must do a incredible job as a german teacher😊🌸
I hope one day to learn this language and I will follow your "advice": I'm gonna learn in a calm way... not so "over". I will take and enjoy step by step😊🌺
Thanks for you video🌸
warum, wieso und weshalb haben einen Kontext und sind nicht notwendigerweise synonym
wieso hat einen erklärenden Kontext, weshalb hat einen kausalen Kontext, warum hat einen philosophischen Kontext
Einfach ausgedrückt: Naturwissenschaftler stellt zuerst die "welhalb"-Frage um eine Ursache zu finden und beantwortet dann die "wie" bzw. "wieso"-Frage um dies zu erklären. Den Theologen und Philosophen überlässt man dann das "warum".
Weshalb dreht sich die Erde um ihre eigene Achse? Weil sie aus einer Aktkreditionsscheibe um die Sonne entstanden ist.
Wieso bzw. wie dreht sich die Erde um ihre eigene Achse? Weil der Impuls der Masse aus der sie entstanden ist eine Richtung haben muss, Stichwort: Drehimpuls
Warum dreht sie die Erde um ihre eigene Achse? Weil Gott es so gewollt hat, weil es die Gesetze der Physik wollen ...
Die Antwort auf eine Warum-Frage lässt sich daher immer wieder mit einer "warum"-Frage Kontern - die einzigen richtigen Fragen sind "wie/wieso" oder "weshalb".
In der englischen Sprache gibt es dafür "why" (warum) und "how" (wie) - dass man heute auch weshalb in der englischen Sprache einfach mit "why" verwendet ist traurig, dafür wäre "for what reason" oder ähnliches deutlich passender.
ein Nachtrag - der muss sein, sorry: www.hornoxe.com/wp-content/picdumps/picdump491/picdump491_37.jpg
my theory: wieso, weshalb and warum was found by german kids to annoy their parents with questions while seeming eloquent.
The way I differentiate "warum" and "wieso" is by thinking of "warum" as "why" and "wieso" as "how so" heck "wie + so" actually do mean "how + so" in German.
Ich weiß nicht wieso aber obwohl mein Englisch unterirdisch schau ich deine Videos wirklich gern und manchmal versteh ich sogar was. Es macht mir extrem viel Spaß dir und Erik dabei zu zuschauen wie ihr die deutsche und englische Sprache auseinander nimmt und so manches kompliziertes aufdeckt :) Macht bitte weiter so ^^
Und wenn du so weiter machst ist ein Englisch irgendwann nicht mehr unterirdisch. Das geht schneller als du denkst.
Ich war bis zur 9. Klasse immer schlecht in Englisch. Aber als ich angefangen habe Computerspiele auf Englisch zu spielen und Filme, die ich gut kannte auf Englisch zu schauen wurde es innerhalb von 2 Jahren so gut, dass ich in der Oberstufe plötzlich ein 1er Schüler war.
I started taking german in September and before that I did three years of Spanish, my first language is French but I've been raised in an English society, anyways, in both german and Spanish class after a few weeks my teachers in high went straight to teaching us in the new language and we ask many questions for words we don't understand and stuff and they'll always explain in French (I've only been to French schools), it's very easy for me to get lost in class but then when I get home and get to doing the homework I figure out what the teacher had been talking about in class or I go back to a previous text and be like so that's what that meant, in other words, I find that learning a language can often be hard but I really love learning and a good teacher makes a world of difference, I hope to keep working on my German to one day be fluent
Erik is adorable! xD
so true
"Do you want to sleep with me?" -> "Kommst Du noch für einen Kaffee mit rauf?"
I guess you are like me, I snore all night and keep people awake.
it's why I won't stay at hostals
There are way worse things a theachr can say than «I don't know». Sometimes when a teacher did not know the answer, they pretended my question was irrelevant, when it was not.
For both Mr. Kirchner and Mr. Macedo. First thank you for the excellent quality of our discussion. Let me add that I agree with you both that the learning of a language consists of both its organic use by the learner and the systematisation of the language - it's grammar, syntax and structure. In my own experience over four decades old designing courses, teaching them and observing how people learn, the best way to impart a second (or greater) language to a learner is in a way as close as possible to how an infant, child or young person learns it. This complex, living process normally begins with listening, observing, imitating, repeating, their way through words, phrases, sentences, dialogue, conversation and paragraphs over weeks, months and years. During this time,the systematisation of the language happens as a natural outgrowth of language usage, as learners see and experience through actual use what proper trends exist (tenses, endings, conjugations, etc) and of course also encounter things not appropriate - things to avoid. This is definitely not to say that these processes (organic usage and systematising theory) are separate from one another, or only happen one behind the other. Normally, systematisation starts in learners soon after normal usage begins, but is almost never profitable to use as the principle backbone of language instruction. If this is done, then learners must in effect learn two "languages" - the language itself, and also the language of linguistics. There is a blending, balance between learning only usage, and learning both the usage and language theory. My words here do not adequately describe this, I am afraid. I hope you can help me clarify.
Yay! I found someone to watch who also enjoys being a teacher. Your videos are awesome!
I have to argue with no. 1. When it comes to learning vocabulary our brain is capable to catch and remember all kinds of exotic words as long they are immediately connected with a unique or emotional situation. Since he has to learn "Teppich" or "Dienst" anyway, this is a good situation to give him a good and unique memory for those words.
5:44 Ehm, Eric, can you explain to me why are there so many words for “aufhören” in English? I know “to stop”, “to quit”, “to cease” and “to discontinue”. :-P
Next video Erick teaching Trixie Español :D The world wants to hear the rabbit in Spanish
No! I wouldn't understand one damn word! It would be totally useless!
Yes! That would be awesome!
***** But only when the videos are captioned in either English or German. Spanish is just such a weird language and I have really *no* interest at all in learning it, and every time I have to hear it, it annoys me. So I'd probably watch these videos muted and read the subtitles.
+Seegal Galguntijak What a pity! I value the sound and style of the Spanish language very much and appreciated the ability to learn it in school. I like the emotion every word transports. Please give it a chance, you are missing something!
JuMixBoox To me, the emotions that are transported with the sound of the language - not unlike Italian - all feel like anger, hate and frustration, and that makes the language sound ugly in my opinion. But I guess it's a matter of personal taste, so nothing one could really argue about (like different styles of music).
I love your channel, keep up the great work!
I find myself doing some of those things while learning Swedish. It is hard to have patience and take it slow. Great video!
Hey Trixi, I like this video very much. And jep, I also get in these situations aswell, sometimes (→ I teach French). The "funktionale Einsprachigkeit" is quite difficult to grab in class. How ever, I only try to explain the spooky grammar in German, if needed (or I let them *discover* it inductively themselves). And I only use the known vocabulary. About the "warum - weshalb - wieso" part, my advice would be to either let the student(s) research for this and then present it next time or to ask for some research time myself.
Last but not least, I have a question for you: How do you embrace the quirks of your students? :D
One thing that helps me remember my vocabulary is to hear a little history about each word in addition to its meaning. Nothing too in depth - just an interesting factoid or two. And especially if it's a compound word, I like to know the meanings of its component words along with an explanation (even if only an educated guess) of how they came to be merged into a new word, often with a new meaning of its own. For example, I noticed "langeweile" begins with "lange" which I know concerns length or describes something long, and "weile" is like English "while" denoting a span of time. So I thought to myself: Hmm. In German, if I say "long while" as a single word, literally translated, I am no longer (necessarily) describing a lengthy stretch of time, but a new thought, a new mood, that corresponds with English's "boredom". And I even toyed with the thought that perhaps German speakers, long ago, simply described the feeling of boredom, regardless of its actual duration, as compared to waiting a long while for something to happen. Perhaps it began as a two-word metaphor, then later evolved into the more solid concept it defines today, as a single word. I confess I never did research that one, although more often than not I do. So I don't know the real story behind "langeweile". But the mental experiment alone was enough to help me remember it forever. Now... I did have one teacher who discouraged me from doing this. She told me I should just learn my vocabulary as presented in the textbook, without breaking words down into constituents and thus adding more work to my plate. I hated her. The End. (Just kidding) But I did defy her every step of the way. I stubbornly continued to learn words this way, and simply didn't tell her about it. I hope that's not one of your pet peeves, Trixi! Do you also prefer your students stick to a certain curriculum? Or do you encourage them to use their own mnemonics? Maybe something in between? -Phill, Las Vegas
This was helpful. My boyfriend is teaching me, so it's good to be reminded of his struggles.
The last point reminds me so much at my japanese classes (was studying for 4 years until this year).
We often found sentences, where you should use word X instead of Y, even though it had the same meaning. When we asked the teacher, the answer was most of the time "You are correct, you could use Y here, but... it's a bit different. Just use X in this case"
It's impossible to explain every sentence if your students only know the basics and ask questions about some really advanced stuff. It became some kind of a running gag for us, when she said "das ist anders"
Love no 5. The sentence structure in German really goes crazy sometimes. I attended German classes for 5 school years (20 years ago), and stuff like this is waaaay over my head :)
I understand Erick position, as a spanish speaking myself most of the time i take to learn another language, like Japanese we have to part porf english and not spanish, even when we can have very good or excellent english we are using another language in between our brain, we can go for English to the new one but sometimes the brain needs the spanish conector to understand fully some words or sentences. I have a cousin in Berlin with regular English trying to learn German fast for inclusion as a german himself but as Erick a Venezuelan new german (for a way to describe it) and he is 2 years in the process and still think only know half of what he needs. damn german is hard, but I will love for a dedicated (and nice) teacher as you are.
Verb, Nomen, Adjektiv, present simple, imparfait,... Die Ausdrücke mussten wir immer gleich zu Beginn lernen. Und zwar immer in der jeweiligen Sprache. Da mussten wir uns wohl auf die Lehrersprache einstellen. Super Video!
Well, I honestly think a teacher being able to admit that he or she simply doesn't know the answer is a good teacher. because face it, nobody knows everything. Not even a teacher who studied up to 9 terms. One does never stop learning :)
hey i just found your wonderful channel. Im a German teacher too, and i can relate to everything you say in this video
Ach Trixi...! Das ist alles so wahr! Ich arbeite selbst als eine Deutschlehrerin in Polen (also ich bin Polin und ich unterrichte Deutsch in Privatschule) und ich kenne alle diese Situationen aus eigener Erfahrung, Manchmal stellen mir meine Schüler solche unfassbare Fragen, dass ich gleichzeitig laut lachen und heulen will. Meistens fragen sie nach kleinen Einzelheiten, die sich nich wirklich erklären lassen, denn…es ist nun mal so. Oder während ihrer ersten Unterrichtsstunde wollen sie unbedingt wissen, wie man „ditch” und „truck traktor” auf deutsch sagt. (notwendiges Wissen :>) Trotzdem habe ich diese Arbeit wirklich lieb und alle meine Schüler sind einfach fantastiche Leute. Alle diese Geschichten, die sie mir erzählen und wie sie mit der Sprachblokade kämpfen, wie sie Lernschritte machen -das ist alles so wichtig für mich. Die beste Arbeit, die ich je hatte ! Und manchmal teile ich mit meinen Lieblingsschülern witzige Neuigkeiten, die ich bei dir gesehen habe :)
This was very funny :) Poor little Eric who came out as a little bit annoyng over-self-challenging student hahaha. He was great. Send him my regards.
Are you suggesting conjugating prefix verbs is not a day one activity? I did enjoy taking spanish from a professor of spanish. But even he had to say "you just have to memorize it" on a regular basis. But he did have a lot of insight into why certain parts of spanish were weird.
Hello! I just wanted to say that I'm trying to learn English, not German but your videos help me to practice my english understanding jaja thank you!
I love reading all sorts of books and have been curious what books I should buy in German to get a feel for the German language. Elementary level is fine as long as I can eventually move up from it but don't want to start with something to hard and lose confidence. Any recommendations will be appreciative,thanks
do I have a problem with my eyes or the image sometimes out of focus for a second or two?
I just came across this video and can relate to ALL these situations....I teach spanish to English speakers and the situations are the same!! Thanks for your videos
ich brauch deutsch Nachhilfe wie heißt den das Dingsda wo ich nicht weiß wie es heißt?
Not that I can decypher what you are trying to say, but it looks like you meant wisse, not weiß.
i need help by the word i don´t know(perhabs "dingsda" is the Confusing)
Bier
Cool, wenn man 4 Buchstaben in dem Wort Mama ändert, hat man auf einmal BIER ! :D
Und wenn man zwei Buchstaben im Wort Bier ändert, hat man KNIE. Was das jetzt wiederum zu bedeuten hat, kann uns nur ein Mitglied der Illuminaten erklären.
where is it possible to find comparative table of german times & voices correlated with their usage popularity? Thank You in advance.
To #5: I think it's still worth it, do deal with too complicated things: When I heared the musical "Hair", I noticed a song, which seemed not really to fit in: "What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, ..." It gets quite elaborate further on. After I realized, that is was a citation from Shakespeare's "Hamlet", I started to read more of Shakespeare's poems. I did not understand each and every word, but I developped a feeling, how rich and beautiful English can be. I also enlarged my vocabluray that way considerably.
Yes! I happen to be an atheist, but I think everyone ought to read the Bible if for no other reason than that it will inform his or her understanding of English literature. It should be noted, however, that Shakespeare, though written in what is technically considered Modern English, contains lots of beautiful but archaic formulations and vocabulary, and thus is difficult reading even for most native English speakers.
I used to teach ESL in the US. I had 87 students in a classroom with 30 desks. We weren’t allowed to cap enrollment. Students from all parts of the world. I did my best. But the questions.... wow. No filter.
It really surprised me how many of my classmates didn't know what verbs, adjectives, nouns and adverbs were.
Coming from the Persian language, German was the easiest language for me to learn so far! Freue mich, dass du so viel Spaß am Lehren hast! \0/
Und sicher kommt bald irgendein Deutscher an und will dir weismachen, dass "Lehren" klein geschrieben wird😂😂
Joa mir wurde auch schon vorgeworfen, dass ich falsch liege, weil ich "größer als" anstatt "größer wie" sage.
Die Hürden der Integration sind manchmal sehr witzig. x´D
Arvid Shirasb Es ist unglaublich, wie viele Menschen ihre Muttersprache nicht richtig kennen. xD
Mach mal nen bisschen halb lang, du solltest nicht denken, das alle nicht besser reden können wie die die du kennst. Ich kann seid ich ein Kind war richtig deutsch und da bin ich nicht die einzigste.
(....Sorry, nein, keine Panik. Ich wollte nur ein schönes Beispiel bringen mit so vielen schrecklich nervigen, aber dauernd gemachten Fehlern wie möglich :D )
Lulu S Haha, ja sehr treffend, aber zum Glück bin ich die ersten Jahre hier auf´s Gymnasium gegangen und habe solche Deutsche erst in meiner Ausbildung kennen gelernt.
Ich finde es auch eher schade, dass die Bildung in den letzten Jahrzehnten so vernachlässtigt wurde in Deutschland, in einem der am meisten industrialisierten Länder der Welt mit dem größten Bedarf an Fachkräften... Darin liegt auch die Haupt-Ursache für diese katastrophalen Wahlergebnisse, sowohl in Europa, als auch in Amerika...
Also ich habe mich nie "überlegen" gefühlt, habe mich nur gewundert. ;)
Love your videos.
You brought an interesting point about: warum, weshalb, wie so.
Funnily enough there is an explanation.
Warum is why - is the most common way of asking for a reason for doing something.
Wie so is how so - is also not an uncommon way of saying why but with "how is that possibile" as an implied question in mind
Weshalb does not have an exact English translation but the best way to translate it would be " for what reason" and as you said it, its more common to see it in formal language than in everyday language (deshalb=for that reason)
It's as difficult as to grasp as why the answer to a Warum question starts with Weil and not with Darum.
Also I don't believe that using terms like verb, adjective, pronoun, preposition, plusquamperfekt, konjunktiv I, Konjunktiv II, etc. is your mistake. I'm Polish, and I've been learning foreign languages for the most of my life (English, German and Japanese). And knowing those terms is essential to understand anything. Sorry to Eric, but he's probably American and that explains his lack of knowledge (due to never before having to learn a foreign language seriously)
"Teacher's eye", absolutely true. Best way to do in that situation, I think, is to ask "ok, can you explain it to me, please?", because then they realize they didn't understand it.
Ich wünschte ich hätte jemanden, der mir Englisch beibringen könnte. Aber tolles Video, wie immer ich hoffe, dass du weiter so tolle Videos machst! Lg Patrick
I'm wondering if using childrens books, such as toddler level books that parents read to their toddlers would be good to read. I notice most, if not, all of them in English, have small and basic words.
A language serves a practical purpose. I don't need to learn all these "simple" words first if I want to translate some sentence from a book, a film or a song. I like this way of learning. I need the vocabulary I need, not what I don't. Besides, if you're good at special vocabulary then understanding of simple frequent words is easy for you.
Wieso is how so(it can be used when a person is kind of surprised), warum is why, weshalb and weswegen is for what reason.
gebaut worden sein koennte - could have been built
gebaut worden koennte - could be built
"Sein" makes the action completed. It's actually not that complicated once you understand the structure, once you're a German.
Trixi what do you think of computer programs such as 'Rosetta Stone' to learn German?? Your idea of their pros/cons and are they worth the cost?? Are there better programs??
I have an English nit. A guinea pig in English idiom usually refers to somebody being used in an experiment, where the outcome is uncertain, with implications that the person being so used may be ignorant of their role or unwilling, and the outcome may be unpleasant. It doesn't need to be really scientific; it could be something like using Erick as your makeup dummy to try new combos of foundation and blush.
It comes from the use of guinea pigs in actual science experiments.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinea_pig#Scientific_research
In this case Erick is acting the part of your class, as an abstract / composite. There's no experiment or surprise outcome. He's role-playing.
I tried to come up with an equivalent noun. Stand-in? Straight man? Foil? (Foil: "In literature, theatre/theater, etc., a character who helps emphasize the traits of the main character.")
Anyway, this nit may be of no interest to you, and I certainly don't mean that it detracted from the video AT ALL. But I appreciate your videos, and "native English speaker nit-picking" is my only currency to repay you. That and "compliments from a German learner".
I love your channel, I love the way how you explain yourself (and what wonderful English pronunciation). Do you teach by distance ?
I can most definitely relate to these situation as a German teacher. There might as well be a couple of scenarios that you didn't include, for instance when the student keeps asking questions making the rest of the group feel either intimidated or annoyed not to mención bored as hell hahahaha
Grüße aus Mexiko, Trixie :D
The 'Teacher Language' one really resonated with me. When I was trying to learn German the teacher suddenly started talking about how a word was the something participle or the present tense continuing for was ... I'd not come across that terminology so felt really stupid. This was the early 1990s so I couldn't even Google the terms.
Sometimes you can backtrace similar words to different root words for example "tolererieren" and "dulden", basically mean the same, but the first one comes from latin and the second one is from old germanic. So instead of just saying I don't know, you can say I will look up the origins of these words. :)
Trixie I really want to learn German, I have learned alot of the basic and am a fast learner but since I have no one who speaks german...i cant practice it. Do you give online classes? And if so how much would they be? IT WOULD BE AWESOME IF YOU WERE TO TEACH ME!
how many popular times in spoken german? have you ever tried to give spoken basics within two months, to set learners to free language sail after?
Kannst du ein Video darüber machen, wie man jemandem eine Fremdsprache (Wörter und Grammatik) sytematisch beibringt?
Ich würde auch gerne Englisch oder Deutsch (in der Freizeit) unterrichten, weiß aber nicht, wo ich da anfangen sollte...
Here is a good sentence for you! Read rhymes with lead, and read rhymes with lead, but read and lead don’t rhyme, and neither do read and lead.
LOL!! Ain't English a bitch? :)
How do I get in the HATER Book ?
I taught German for a few years. I remember the "blank stare" you get from students who claim to know things they don't when they have to respond. German isn't my first language, but I have an idea of explaining "Why:" Warum=most common, wieso=slightly less so and weshalb =formal. Don't be afraid to say "I don't know". You can always look it up.
I am also very keen of that, what is the difference betwenn warum, wieso and deshalb :D So, if you find out an answer to this question, tell us:)
Some thoughts...
In dealing with sentence structure, look at malformed structures from the standpoint of the speaker's native language. Usually, this is easier in a written context. Once you get to the point of understanding what that other language's apparent rule is, you can more easily disassemble their language and show them the equivalent structure in the target language.
Teaching a language you know, whether your native language or not, makes you go back and question your own knowledge. This is sometimes useful when searching for an answer to give to a student.
I assume this is the case in German, but in English, where you have several overlapping words for the same thing, it is usually the case that each has a different connotation, or different implied meaning.
There are many philosophical concepts that the late polyglot teacher Michel Thomas and I share. One of them is to get your student to think about what it is they are trying to say. As the learner, when you feel you understand what it is you are trying to accomplish, the things which otherwise frustrate you tend to drop away.
I would add to this that a multidisciplinary approach is the best suited to this and many other tasks because you can approach a problem from many different angles.
Wer, wie, was - wieso, weshalb, warum. Also, da war doch was in meiner Kindheit... hmmm.
Sometimes not the answer, but the question is the wrong on. Don't ask why you have 3 words with the same meaning, but how you can use them. For example to have another word for "warum" may be usefull to avoid unwanted alliterations and improve the melody of a sentence. However, this is far beyond the goals of the first lessons.
...der, die, das, wieso weshalb warum, wer nicht fragt ist dumm😂
+Fall Out Panic! at the Black Veil Romance Bleibt, nicht ist.
oha!!! habe gerade realisiert: "wer nicht fragt bleibt dumm." habe ich als kind so interpretiert, dass alle kinder am anfang dumm sind und nur schlauer werden, wenn sie erwachsenen fragen stellen.
wenn dem so ist würde das die herablassende haltung erwachsener gegenüber kinder ausdrücken.
kann jmd diese interpretation nachvollziehen???
Cygnus Das ist eine allgemeine Aussage.
Russpelz ist trotzdem negativ formuliert.
man könnte auch sagen "wer fragt kann was lernen"
klar, in einem lied muss man auch beachten, dass der satz reinpasst, aber warum muss man überhaupt das wort "dumm" in ein kinderlied einbauen?
When you say "What does 'Do you wanted to sleep with me tonight?' mean in German?" it doesn't actually make sense in English. What you should ask is "How do you say 'Do you want to sleep with me tonight?' in German?"
As an English sentence, it doesn't mean anything in German.
thanks for your motivation!😊
having alot of Synonymous is a good and a bad thing. for someone who's learning a new language it's most likely that he/she will learn one word that describes the thing so when someone else asks you using another word you will be like whaa! :) nice video
That is right, a lot of vocab but our writers can make really great art with it.
+Kaiserinmeli of course! as i said it's a good and a bad not just bad😛
1 - Congrats on breaking the 100k subs! (old news)
2 - I suppose you've seen this already, but you could do something Totally Trixie with this idea - from BuzzF**d: 24 Products From Germany The Rest Of The World Never Asked For
3 - LOVE your channel. I'll just stop there ;)
It is definitely something, that should not concern new learners, but there is a difference between 'wieso?', 'weshalb?' and 'warum?'.
While 'wieso?' originates from something like 'wie kam das so?' similar to latin 'qui sic?' and therefore asks for the source of something, 'weshalb?' comes from Middle High German 'was' + 'halben' (direction, reason) and is hence asking for the purpose. 'Warum?' finally is a hybrid form of Middle High German 'was' and 'umbe' (local preposition: for, why, etc) and so asks for the motive.
Of course today they are used synonymically. I know no German native speaker who uses them this way (if not intuitively) - but I still think the etymology and former use is interesting!
Bisschen spät, aber ich muss dazu echt mal ne Anekdote bringen, weil ich das Gefühl mittlerweile nur zu gut kenne.
Als ich in Japan studiert habe, habe ich auch einen Deutschkurs für Anfänger besucht (um Kontakte zu knüpfen und weil ich den Lehrer mag) und da auch das ein oder andere über Linguistik gelernt. Nun hatte ich in diesem Kurs zwei überaus ambitionierte Chinesen neben mir sitzen. Vor allem einer der beiden war relativ schnell im Lernen, aber so manches Mal haben mich die beiden mit ihren Fragen auch in den Wahnsinn getrieben.
Wann immer wir etwas gelernt haben, was es in ihrer Sprache nicht gibt (und auch im Japanischen nicht, was beide fließend beherrschten und ich auch halbwegs) beugten sie sich zu mir rüber und baten um Hilfe. Manchmal ging das einigermaßen, nachdem ich irgendwie mit Händen und Füßen das nötige japanische Vokabular zusammengekratzt hatte (mein Chinesisch ist leider nicht der Rede wert und Englisch konnten die beiden nicht so gut) aber manchmal dacht ich so: Euer Ernst jetzt?
Da erklärt der Lehrer also das grammatikalische Geschlecht und die Flektion und die beiden kommen wieder gefährlich nahe und fragen ganz ernst gemeint: Wie kann ich mir das merken?
Und ich so völlig hilflos: ... Keine Ahnung, ich bin Muttersprachler...!
Die Beiden: Ja, aber... irgendwoher musst du doch wissen, wann du was benutzt!
Und ich immer verzweifelter: Ja, aber für mich ist es halt einfach logisch, weil ich es ja immer schon so benutzt habe und von meiner Familie so gehört habe. Ich hab ja nur nachgemacht, was alle anderen Deutschen gemacht haben und so die Sprache gelernt.
Ende vom Lied: Unbefriedigte Gesichter, awkward silence.
Da ist es dann immer von Vorteil, wenn der Fremdsprachenlehrer die gleiche Muttersprache hat wie der Schüler, denn der kann dann für ihn logische Tipps geben. Denn selbst wenn ich jetzt z.B. Französin wäre und auch nur Deutsch gelernt hätte, wäre meine Taktik wahrscheinlich für Chinesen gar nicht nachvollziehbar. x,D
Du bist super, Trixie! :D Meine Muttersprache ist Englisch und ich liebe Deutsch lernen. Deutsch ist so spaß! Du bist eine gute Lehrerin.
who did catch your hair and made a ponytail for you? 😜
I really like ponys .... on the back of the head! ;)
Was heißt denn jetzt Teppich Verlegungs und Reinigungsdienst?
Just something I noticed. You said "rule of thumbs". The saying is actually "rule of thumb" in the singular. I new to your channel but am enjoying it.
There is a reason that classwork tackles these things in the first year. If you get persons, tenses, etc. out of the way, everything gets easier. Good luck to you if he's never been exposed to that. A good text would probably help.
warum=why (easy everyday use just as a question word) weshalb= for which (what) reason... The meaning is just the same as in "warum". wieso, again the same meaning just as wherefore. English also has many ways to ask or say "why".
Really great video and really interesting to be personally. I am in Erik's position !
"The eyes"... My teachers sometimes asked whether I understood and at this specific point at which they won't allowed me to lie to them I just said. "Yeah I didn't get it, but you can keep going, I'' figure it out."
Your students don't know these terms? What people do/did you teach? I mean I learned the basics of that stuff in grade school.
Definitely! I think sometimes teachers can be too insistent about mastering one thing before moving on to the next. If something is a sufficiently important part of the language, you _will_ figure it out eventually, simply by being confronted by it over and over again
Aa a German learner I can finally translate “Teppich Verlegungs und Reinigungs Dienst“. Carpet laying and cleaning Service
trixi looks really good with these glasses XD
,all German I have know/learned has been on my own....I love it... can read more than what i hear... put more videos of where ones like me can learn the speaking...bitter, und danke
Habt ihr für die Aufnahme die Brille immer weitergegeben oder habt ihr beide die gleiche? xD