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Learning German Plurals | ||
Tags: Morphology | German | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| soclydeza85 Senior Member United States Joined 3898 days ago 357 posts - 502 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German, French | Message 1 of 7 19 March 2014 at 10:32pm | IP Logged |
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As I'm sure all German learners know, German noun plurals are all over the place. I know there are some "general" rules to follow but I feel like there are too many exceptions to rely on them. How did you guys learn German plurals? I know I can just study the plural form along with the singular as I memorize the nouns but part of me feels that this might be a waste of time (I will eventually be able to pick them up through reading, listening, exposure, etc) and that the extra time would be better spend learning more words. Thoughts? What were/are your strategies?
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 DavidStyles Octoglot Pro Member United Kingdom Joined 3932 days ago 82 posts - 179 votes Speaks: English*, German, Italian, Spanish, Latin, French, Portuguese, Norwegian Studies: Mandarin, Russian, Swedish, Danish, Serbian, Arabic (Egyptian) Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 7 19 March 2014 at 10:42pm | IP Logged |
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At that stage, I started by just putting "die" in front and sticking an "n" on the end, ie, pretending everything is regular, and being prepared to accept that this will be often wrong (albeit generally understood).
Then just worked up a mental databank of words that don't fit that pattern, in an ad hoc fashion, and gradually improved my writing from there. Learning the plural along with the singular is of certainly good especially if not too onerous, such as if you find a nice source of vocabulary lists that gives you vocab with plurals listed, or at least listed where not regular. Otherwise, yes, I for one would advocate for settling for "good enough" in some areas that can cope with being a touch sloppy, and focusing on the areas where your study will get more "bang for your buck". 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| chokofingrz Pentaglot Senior Member England Joined 5180 days ago 241 posts - 430 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Japanese, Catalan, Luxembourgish | Message 3 of 7 20 March 2014 at 12:06am | IP Logged |
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I did a lot of Anki flashcards for nouns, making sure to put the article on the front and the plural after.
But I didn't stress too much about studying these plurals. The meaning is the most important. You will learn the plurals of all the most common nouns through exposure, and beyond that, bluff it and accept a few mistakes. If you feel it is still a weakness you can always go back to your flashcards later for some reinforcement. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4613 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 4 of 7 20 March 2014 at 10:54am | IP Logged |
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There is no easy way. Like you say, there are some patterns you can spot but, generally speaking, the German plural system is a minefield.
Extremely common terms like Männer and Häuser should sink in fast enough but I found it was a case of picking the plurals up through repeated listening. Learning the plural along with the singular is a great idea, although in practise you would have to be a robot to instantly recall them all. I suppose a beginner's workaround is simply to use the singular if the plural escapes you. But after a while, I found myself having a guess at unfamiliar plurals, and quite often getting it right. It's almost as if the language pulls you in the right direction once you have reached a certain level of ability (coupled with confidence). You find yourself successfully pluralising Vertrag (contract) with Verträge. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| albysky Triglot Senior Member Italy lang-8.com/1108796Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4379 days ago 287 posts - 393 votes Speaks: Italian*, English, German | Message 5 of 7 20 March 2014 at 1:53pm | IP Logged |
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I simply do not learn them directly .I use the rules when it is possible , like ung , heit , keit need en . Outside
of that i simply rely on a lot of listening and reading to develop a feel for the language so that when i have to guess it is more likely that i will get it right . So my method is basically ,using the rules when possible , use the plurals that , for a namber of reasons , have sunk in, otherwise gussing (supported by experience ) . 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| ScottScheule Diglot Senior Member United States scheule.blogspot.com Joined 5219 days ago 645 posts - 1176 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Latin, Hungarian, Biblical Hebrew, Old English, Russian, Swedish, German, Italian, French | Message 6 of 7 20 March 2014 at 5:30pm | IP Logged |
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I may be in the minority, but though at first I found German plurals challenging, once I started learning them, they quickly became easy.
To do this, I simply memorized the genitive singular and the plural nominative with each term I learned. At first this was tricky (I used Anki). I was hesitant--now I have to memorize three things for each word? that'll be so time-consuming!--but in a remarkably short time I learned to spot patterns and exceptions. This has been the case in other areas--such as memorizing the principal parts of a Latin verb (there are typically four). Seemed daunting at first, but after some initial hard work patterns presented themselves and vocabulary expansion proceeded at the normal rate. Edited by ScottScheule on 20 March 2014 at 7:22pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Sarnek Diglot Senior Member Italy Joined 4206 days ago 308 posts - 414 votes Speaks: Italian*, English Studies: German, Swedish | Message 7 of 7 22 March 2014 at 4:48pm | IP Logged |
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Having spent almost a year learning German nouns, I feel like there's a pattern somewhere
which I can't really see, but rather "feel". Now I get it right 9 times out of 10. So my suggestion is to learn the the plural together with the singular (as you would learn the article together with the word), and then keep on practising, practising and practising... 1 person has voted this message useful |
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