Do I need to do all the exercises or are there some I can skip?
YES, I recommend doing ALL the exercises and doing them thoroughly!
What is the benefit of doing all the exercises and doing them thoroughly?
The difference between doing all the exercises thoroughly and just rushing through them can be tremendous in the long run.
It can mean the difference between feeling fluent, expressing your thoughts quickly and confidently and feeling like you always have to think about words and structures and make a titanic effort to memorize them.
Keep in mind that you want to get to the point where you can turn thoughts and ideas into words without having to think about it too hard.
It should increasingly become unconscious, and not require you to constantly try to recall the needed words or structures. Especially when you’re speaking and just want to have a fluent conversation.
To achieve this you’ll need to truly engage with the language by doing many exercises and seeing the words and structures you are learning embedded in a variety of content through reading, listening, writing and speaking.
So I encourage you to do ALL the exercises and even go one step further:
READ every single word of every exercise OUT LOUD.
Read observantly, pay attention to details and focus on understanding what you’re reading or hearing!
You’ll reap the benefits in the long run, becoming more and more fluent and confident, noticing that words and expressions pop up in your mind without your having to think about them.
Now, what is the key difference between reading silently and reading aloud?
When you read silently you just read with your eyes. You are not noticing all the details of the language because your brain’s goal is just to understand the message and move on to the next task.
Let’s take an example.
- Ich gehe mit meiner Frau. (I go with my wife.)
When you read this quickly, just with your eyes, you might just notice the least amount of information.
The sentence Ich gehen* mit mein* Frau. contains the same message. But you see, the right endings Ich gehe mit meiner Frau make the difference between correct German and survival German.
If you just want a tourist level, it’s ok. If you want to speak correct German, you ‘ll need to make a special effort to notice more and more of such details.
These endings are very different to English and of course create special challenges on a way to mastering them.
When you read aloud, you pay more attention to these details. You pronounce them and you hear them. This way little by little you can more than double your capability to notice the details and the ability to retain them.
Reading aloud also helps you increase your oral fluency, improves your pronunciation and helps you learn to correct yourself, since you’re practicing pronouncing correct, real sentences.
So yes, it will take a little bit more time to read aloud but it will more than double the learning effect.
The exercises are only in German. How can I quickly translate unknown words to have a better understanding?
You can use these external online dictionaries to look up words:
- Leo.org
- Linguee.de (this one gives you a lot of samples of actual real articles where the word is used in context)
TIP: Use this great text reader tool to translate instantly each word you need to look up and automatically create flashcards so you can recap later all new words at your convenience on your mobile phone.
What if I make mistakes in the exercises? Do I always need to correct them?
NO, never!
Keep moving forward. Don’t reload the exercises in order to correct them.
Why?
Because there’s no learning effect from seeing the solution and then just redoing something as suggested.
Instead, just hover over the mistake to see what your mistakes are. Read the suggested correction and try to notice the details you got wrong.
Then, move on and just try to do better in the next exercise.
What if I do a lot of mistakes? Which error-rate is acceptable?
In the official Goethe exams you’re supposed to have more than 60% of correct answers in order to pass.
So if more than 60% of your answers are right, you’re doing a great job. :-)
How can I create a consistent learning routine with my busy life?
Yes, there will be a lot of exercises to do but remember, learning a new language is a marathon, not a sprint.
So instead of looking for shortcuts try to solve this challenge in a different way: