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| diplomaticus Newbie United States Joined 3975 days ago 23 posts - 31 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 33 of 38 22 July 2015 at 2:54am | IP Logged | ||
I just wanted to chime in about Assimil and grammar. I have zero background in German, and started the newest Assimil course for it (just entitled "German" in English). I am 9 lessons in, and quite enjoy it. The voice quality is wonderful and quite pleasant to listen to. The audio isn't so slow as to seem unnatural, but the speak so clearly that even tricky or long words are easy to repeat. It really is quite refreshing from audio I've experienced in other languages that seems to have more English than the target language. The grammar for German seems to be no joke, though. Day 8 and already the subjunctive is getting thrown around! I came to the conclusion that I needed to get a grammar supplement to use with this. I have a few grammars, but wanted to get something with drills. Always wanting to support local used book stores, I went and got a copy of Hugo's German in 3 Months, original printing in 1969, Teach Yourself German, 1971 copy, Colloquial German from 1941, Berlitz Self-Teacher German from 1950 Does anyone more experienced in German know how much the language has changed? I know there are spelling reforms and all, but the new Assimil is up to date on that. Is grammar more or less left unchanged? Or would it be a poor idea to use such an old grammar? I see books on Amazon like Essential German Grammar that are getting rave reviews even half a century after publication, so it makes me think I shouldn't worry too much, but outside opinions are always welcome. All told, buying all of these set me back $1.50, so it is absolutely not a problem if they should be seen of as more of a novelty than a wise investment for study time. If nothing else, they make my bookshelf look good ;) The reviews of that Klipp und Klar book make it seem good, but maybe a bit too advanced since I am a beginner: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Klipp-Klar-Ubungsgrammatik-Grundstuf e- Losungen/dp/3126753221/ref= Any other suggestions for a good basic grammar with exercises/drills to use alongside Assimil if none of the old Berlitz, TY, Hugo, or Colloquial are a good idea? Or, alternatively, if older grammars are fine, any suggestions on which to work through? The Berlitz I'd probably skip since it has no explicit grammar from what I see. Of the others, it looks like the TY (by Sir John Adams) is the simplest, with Hugo covering more grammar, and then the Colloquial book (by Doring and revised by Hubmann-Uhlich) seems a bit more ambitious. It h as four parts including grammar lessons, reading exercises in literature and well-known poems, etc..... If the age of these isn't an issue, I'd probably work through the TY since it looks simplest and then the Colloquial since it has extra reading exercises. Lastly, are there any German writers known to be straight-forward in their prose? The German Hemingway, if you will. I'd love to get a shorter book to have as a goal to work towards reading like what I see people do with French and The Stranger by Camus. I am not much of a Harry Potter fan. I hope it was ok to put this in your thread! It seemed topical :) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| aokoye Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5551 days ago 235 posts - 453 votes  Speaks: English*, German Studies: Dutch, Norwegian, Japanese | Message 34 of 38 22 July 2015 at 4:52am | IP Logged | ||
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I would suggest you get a book that's actually devoted to grammar. Hugo, Colloquial, and the others
that you mentioned aren't. Routledge has a lot of really good German grammar books, some of them have exercises in the same book and the ones that don't generally also have an analogous workbook (the advantage being that you get more exercises if you have a seperate workbook). The grundstufe Klipp und Klar should be just fine for someone who is a beginner. The topics are A1- B1. Did you look at the sample of the book on Klett's website? If you click Im Buch blättern you'll be able to see a good chunk, if not all, of the book which should give you a good idea of the level. Right now I'm working through German in Review. Which I chose primarily because it's on my shelf and the explanations are better than Huber's Essential Grammar of German (which is also on my bookshelf). 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| diplomaticus Newbie United States Joined 3975 days ago 23 posts - 31 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 35 of 38 22 July 2015 at 5:55am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for your input, aokoye. Good point. If I want to learn the grammar, I should get
something focused on the grammar. I just ordered "Essential German Grammar" by Durrell, Kohl, and Loftus. A new edition just came out and the first edition is quite cheap. From the look inside, it appears there are about 60 pages of grammar exercises, with key, after the grammar book itself! If I am left wanting more, German in Review by Kimberly Sparks appears to have an amazing reputation. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| aokoye Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5551 days ago 235 posts - 453 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Dutch, Norwegian, Japanese | Message 36 of 38 22 July 2015 at 6:12am | IP Logged | ||
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What's also nice about the Sparks book is that it's easily available used. If you do get it the full
answer key can be hard to find but, turns out, a professor at Brigham Young University put it on a website for one of his courses. Mind you, it took a surprising amount of searching to find it, but it's out there. Note that the publisher has a version of the answer key on their website but it's only to a key for some of the exercises in the Lehrbuch. I'm assuming that the one the BYU professor put up is the key that's available to professors (which from what I can tell is also free but you need to have a instructor's account to access). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Rozzie Senior Member United States Joined 3422 days ago 136 posts - 149 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 37 of 38 26 July 2015 at 3:36am | IP Logged | ||
Does this go for any language you are trying to learn? I would like to use it to do my Spanish if you don't mind. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6607 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 38 of 38 27 July 2015 at 12:34am | IP Logged | ||
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This is a decent meta-plan for a Romance or Germanic language :) The most tricky part is deciding what exactly you do and sticking with it.
The numbers are very much adjustable though. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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