How to start?

Before we start learning a new language for me it is important to select the right reference books to guide us throughout our learning process. And why is that? Since early I heard about the four cases that threat any student of German, which are Nominative, Accusative, Dative and Genitive. Well, I am not going to talk about them right now, because I am not the right person to do that, and besides I know almost nothing about them so far. But any way, I know that they exist and that they will determine which ending the nouns and articles will have. For example, in one case we have to use the article Der, while in another case we have to use Den. The situation may become even more nightmarish when the word order enters the equation.

So, picking up a good grammar book will certainly give us a good piece of advice, right? However, let us not burn the candle at both ends trying to remember endless grammar rules that bores us to death. My main goal by learning German, as I am quite sure that is also your goal, is to communicate in the language, right? So, the books I am about to show you will certainly come in handy.

1. Cursos de Idiomas Globo. Alemão. This was the first book that I used to  study, it is a good one, really because there are many conversational situations within it and you can follow the script with mp3 file. And in case you are wondering “Okay, Alisson how did you get this book?” well, I downloaded it from 4shared.com, just went there and I wrote down “Curso de Alemão” just do it and you will have it. You will also find this book interesting to study, because it will show you not only the dialogues and grammar explanations, but also how to behave deppending on the situation you are how to use some words in specific ocations, okay, so for me this is a good book and you can certaintly download it and I can usure you that you will like it. 

Here it is a sample lesson that you will find on this book, have a look:

2. German for Dummies. I simply love this book, even though I have heard a lot of people saying that it fails on so many levels and that it is hard to know where to begin and etc. but for me it is quite helpful, because it gives you done sentences that you will have to learn like “How are you” “What is your name?” “What time is it?” so, ‘speakable’ phrases that you will always need to know. In case you are not familiar with the sounds of the language there is always a how-to-pronounce of each words and, of course, the translation, like, Ich habe Anna letzte Woche gesehen (iH hah-be ân-â lêts-te voH-e ge-zey-en) (I saw Anna last week). To download this book is very easy, just go on Google and type: German for Dummies torrent. Its size is 4,50 MB so in no time at all you will have this book.  So far I couldn’t find the CD to download, which is also available, so if you find it tell me here ^_^

3. Themen 1 Aktuell. I first saw this book being used in a German course class on a youtube video.  I tried to buy it, because I think that it is much better to have a hard printed copy than on the computer, since you can have so much options like writing down your answers from the exercises, leaving your observations on every page. However I ended up downloading it. How did I do? Just click here. Do you know the book “American Headway?” if you do, then Themen 1 Aktuell is pretty much the same, only in German. Audio tracks are also available to listen to the dialogues and exercises. This one I am still using and I can unsure you that you will like it.

In addition to books, there are also many online websites that can give us a tremendous support. Let me show you some of them.

1. Deutsch Welle - Deutsch Welle is by far one of the best websites I have seen until now. All German courses by Deutsch Welle are sorted by level, so if you don’t know which one to use the website will give you options according to your level.

2. Pukka German! - Description from the website "Our switched onGerman lessons are guaranteed to pimp your German fluency. With Pukka German you'll learn truck loads of cool German words and phrases and get hip to the street lingo that your German teacher was too SQUARE to teach you! Prepare to fuel inject your German with funny German sayings, cool slang words, popular idioms and plain useful German phrases. It's time to open throttle and flip CLUNKY and OUTDATED German the bird finger."

3. Quero Aprender Alemão - Here it is a blog written by a Brazilian guy who is a German teacher and lives in Germany right now (if I am not wrong). The thing is that you will learn a lot from this blog, because everything is clearly explained and designed to all levels.

4. Extr@ - Extra course offers a series of videos in many languages, and one of them is German, of course. How does it work? It is totally designated for communication. You learn German through everyday situations lived by a group of friends who share a same apartment. I particularly like these videos, because they are funny, easy to understand, even though you don’t have an advanced level of German, and all the videos have subtitles in German, in case you don’t understand what was said.  

   

5. Pimsler - If you want to learn spoken German in the comfort of your own home then Pimsleur German is what you need. You'll quickly learn how to pronounce German words near fluently and get your ears accustomed to spoken German. The only problem with this course is that there is no written material, which means that if you have no idea how that word is written, then you will not have a pdf file to help you. Yet Pimsleur German is the best way to learn the German language (in my humble opinion, of course). You can also download it (this course is not for free, but I managed to find a torrent and then I got it on my computer ^_^) Just click here. And download it right now.

So, this is all for today. I hope you like these tips, and next time we will get started with German. Bis später!