Help learning conjunctions!

January 9, 2023 10:29 AM

I need to massively improve my German and despite living in a German speaking country and hearing it a lot and being able to understand some, I realize I have a major BLOCK with conjunctions. I spent all day today trying to remember some basic ones and no dice. Other types of words aren’t so hard I only need to hear them a few times. Any tips?

We are talking words like: ausserdem (besides), trotzdem (despite), denn (because), sonst (otherwise), deshalb (for this reason)

These are all words I’m hearing all the time but I can’t remember what they mean and then I stumble listening to the rest of the sentence.

posted by catspajammies to Writing & Language (5 answers total)

Best answer: I'm sure better advice will come, but when I get stuck (with German, actually...Deutsche Sprache, schwere Sprache) I usually pick out a sentence that emphasizes the thing I'm stuck on, and just drill that sentence into memory. For example, there's a couple sentences here for außerdem. You could pick one you like and drill that over and over again; eventually your brain should get the memo.

I screw up adjective endings like it's my job, but I never make mistakes with plural-with-die, thanks to Die Toten Hosen. In the absence of a meaningful mnemonic device to get to fluency, these kinds of drills/touchstones are my only hope.
posted by adekllny at 10:48 AM on January 9, 2023 [4 favorites]

Best answer: Ignore me if I'm wrong since I don't know much German, but should the translations for the first two not be "besides that/furthermore" and "despite that/nonetheless"?

Regardless,
ausserdem - can you remember "auss"?
trotzdem - can you remember "trotz"?

Mnemonics can help -- e.g., "I ask my horse so politely to gallop. Nonetheless, he trots!", or "the horse trots despite being asked nicely to gallop".

Furthermore, adekllny's advice is very good.
posted by trig at 11:54 AM on January 9, 2023 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I remember words better if I set them to music in my head. So in this case, I would make up a little song with the words "auserdem/besides" and another one for "trotzdem/despite," etc.

There's something about music combined with words that can work better for some people. I taught my four-year-old niece her address by setting it to the tune of "The Bunny Hop."

Another way would be to combine them into a list with the German and the English translations and memorize the whole list. I've forgotten most of the German I learned, but I still know the German dative and accusative prepositions because my German teacher made us memorize them as lists 45 years ago.
posted by FencingGal at 12:34 PM on January 9, 2023 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Seconding songs!
Or reading children's books that rhyme. Maybe there is one emphasizing conjunctions. I can never never remember the gendered articles with cases... BUT I'll never forget "... die Mutter schaut zum Fenster raus" from the kid's book Häschen Hüpf, so I always get it right for "window".
posted by evilmomlady at 1:24 PM on January 9, 2023 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thank you everyone!!!! These tips were so helpful and I already feel much more positive and have absorbed a few! Thank you!
posted by catspajammies at 12:24 AM on January 10, 2023