I might have told you in a previous post that one of my students at the University where I work went on a holiday to Germany and Austria. Rosalie did a brilliant job of speaking German the whole time, getting really immersed in the German language. But then she came back to Australia and there weren’t really so many opportunities to continue speaking. ‘Do you have any tips?’ she asked.
Well in the past couple of weeks, I posted a number of tips here and here but I’ve been thinking about this on and off ever since. I suggested self-narration and variations as good ways to practise if you have no one else to bounce sentences off. But I wasn’t satisfied. So that’s where I came up with the Circle of Practice. In fact there will be a number of circles of practice, but I’m still putting together an in-depth guide and am about to record a YouTube video to show you what it’s all about. So in the meantime, I wanted to give you one idea to help you to practise.
These examples are fairly simple. I’ve got more complex variations for you to work through coming. These will get you to work through different tenses, the passive, forms of the subjunctive.
What to do
We’ll start with a simple narration of what it is that you are doing—or if you like—of what you have just been doing. I’m going to use the present tense, because it’s easier. For example:
Ich höre Musik
Ich trinke einen Kaffee
Ich lese ein Buch
As you can see it doesn’t have to be a complicated idea.
In fact, it’s best to keep it simple.
The main thing to remember is ONE VERB in the Second Position in the sentence. And for now it will be best to start your sentence with ich since you are the person carrying out the action. And then your verb will come next since in these normal sentences it’s always in the second position. Add in an object (Musik, einen Kaffee, ein Buch). We’ll add in more elements and make some changes to word order soon enough. Your starting sentence is at the top of the circle (in the 12 o’clock position) and now we’re going to work our way around the sentence, adding in elements (Bausteine) and swapping words around.
You can see that we are starting quite easily. So, if you are drinking—or going to drink—a coffee. This is what you do: work clockwise around the circle.
Question: Change the statement into a y/n question.
Answer: Answer by changing the object. Remember that each object (like all nouns) has a gender which means that we need to use the appropriate article.
masculine (Tee, Kaffee, Kakao, Alkohol, Whisky…) einen
feminine (Milch, Cola, Limonade…) eine
neuter (Wasser, Mineralwasser, Bier…) ein.
Continue on with this new object
Adjective: Add in an adjective. Remember that these adjectives will need an adjective ending. If you are using the indefinite article (einen, eine, ein), then your adjective endings are quite easy, since for masculine and feminine they are the same as the article endings. But for the neuter, the article had no ending, so the adjective needs to show that the noun is neuter (by adding on the -es that reminds us of das)
masculine (Tee, Kaffee, Kakao, Alkohol, Whisky…) einen heißen
feminine (Milch, Cola, Limonade…) eine heiße
neuter (Wasser, Mineralwasser, Bier…) ein heißes.
Time Phrase. There are quite a few time phrases you could use here. And since time phrases are often prioritised in German, we’re going to put them in as close the subject & verb as possible. In effect this means after the verb and before the object. Ich trinke jetzt einen heißen Tee. Think about what other time phrases you could use. Other general time phrases like (heute, bald, sofort, gerade, später, nachher etc); a season (im Winter, im Frühling, im Sommer, im Herbst); a month (im Januar, im Februar etc); a day (am Montag, am Dienstag, am Wochenende etc); parts of days (heute Morgen, heute Nachmittag, heute Abend); time of day (um 7, um 19 Uhr, um drei Uhr dreißig, um halb acht etc).
Word Order #1 Now we’re going to start moving other elements into the first position. Remember the leave the verb where it is. This will ‘dislodge’ the subject (ich): Jetzt trinke ich einen heißen Tee.
Word Order #2 And now we’ll shift something else into the first position: the object. Einen heißen Tee trinke ich jetzt. Again, the verb stays in the same position: 2nd place.
Place Phrases: These can be tricky, but I want you to have a bunch of them that you can use at will. Depending on what your initial sentence was, you might need a place phrase that describes a location (zu Hause, in der Stadt, im Café etc), or movement towards a destination (nach Hause, in die Stadt, ins Café etc). Generally locations will be in the dative, and most movements towards a destination will be in the accusative (unless you need to use zum or zur for your movements, and these are also in the dative.)
Let’s go again
We’re back at the top of the circle again; back where we started. So now you’re going to see if you can come up with one new element each time. Use the headings to remind you what to do. Everything else stays the same. For example:
Verbs: Ich kaufe einen Kaffee / Ich möchte einen Kaffee / Ich brauche einen Kaffee
Questions: Kaufst du einen Kaffee? / Möchtest du einen Kaffee? / Brauchst du einen Kaffee?
Answers & Objects: Nein, ich kaufe eine Cola / Nein, ich möchte eine Cola / Nein, ich brauche eine Cola
Adjectives: Ich kaufe eine kalte Cola / Ich möchte eine leckere Cola / Ich brauche eine große Cola
Time Phrase: Just use a different time phrase now (see above). Ich kaufe um 10 eine kalte Cola / Ich möchte sofort eine leckere Cola / Ich brauche bald eine große Cola
Word Order: You’ll do the same as you did last time:
Move the time phrase into the first position (Um 10 kaufe ich eine kalte Cola etc), and then
Move the object in there instead (Eine kalte Cola brauche ich um 10)
Place Phrase
Now just add on another place phrase—following the same guidelines as before. Maybe something like this: Eine kalte Cola kaufe ich beim Supermarkt / Eine kalte Cola kaufe ich in der Stadt
What now?
You’re going to keep going around the circle until if becomes easy, or you run out of things to say.
More Examples
lesen | to read
How many different things can you think of that you might read, or where you might read? Can you work through this without hesitating?
hören | to listen (to)
How many different things can you think of that you might listen to, or where you might listen to it? Can you work through this one too without hesitating?
Das war’s dann für heute. Let me know in the comments if you have any practice tips, or there’s anything in particular you’d like more help with.
Bis bald.
great Work! keep it up
great explication