The A1- German

IloveConverse

Hi guys,

I'm in TY at the moment, but seeing as it's nearing an end I'm starting to think about the LC.

German was probably my favourite subject at Junior Cert. I enjoyed it immensely and have developed a massive interest in the subject. I spend my time listening to German-radio, television, writing and reading books- I love it.

If anyone here is willing to share their advice/stories of how they achieved an A1 in this subject, I'd greatly appreciate it.


Alles Gute und Viel Glueck!

GarIT

It is very difficult to get an A1 you have to have perfect German in the oral, and you have to be really lucky with the questions you are asked. It's similar with the written part. If you put in a lot of work a B1 or A2 should be easy enough. But you have to be flawless for the A1.

jumpguy

I did German in the LC and got an A2 (I know, not quite what you're looking for...but I was going for the A1 :P). As the above poster said, there really isn't much room for error. You have to be quite competent and confident in your German speaking, listening, comprehending and writing. That much is probably obvious!

One of my best friends is fluent in German and his entire family can all speak fluent German. He was doing his LC the same year, so we used to practice our German speaking a massive amount - especially in the run-up to the oral. It was absolutely great, and actually enjoyable learning German that way. I supplemented it with the tedious rote learnt vocab, grammar, phrases and so on, but I think I learnt the most and enjoyed German the most when learning it by speaking with a fluent speaker.

The oral, listening and comprehensions went very well, but unfortunately I was let down by my writing! When you're trying to write a letter, you kinda zone out of focussing on the grammar and stuff and go with instinct. Needless to say, my genders and cases (nominative, accusative, dative) were pretty poor. On top of the few marks I lost in the listening, oral and comprehensions (tough to get 100%) it dragged me down to an A2.

So perfecting your writing is really important for the A1, but if you manage to perfect your spoken German that'll cover the listening, oral, and will help a lot in the comprehensions too.

Good luck!

Patricide

My advice would be to watch shows and read papers/books in German. I myself didn't do German at all in school but it was how I picked it up when I moved to Germany. I looked at the exam tonight and it really didn't look too difficult last year, just make sure you know your grammar rules inside out(I wrote them all out and stuck them to the wall in front of me where my computer is).

If you have an android phone this app is very useful for on the go grammar exercises,

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=da.app.grammatiktrainer

I would also take advantage of the ANKI flashcard app to build up your vocabulary, it really improved mine in a short period of time.

If you don't have an android based phone, I found this website also very good. There is an entire online interactive German course on there from the very basics(A1 level) to mastery(C2).


Edit - Should also mention, if your travelling abroad or want to watch movies/series. Try to stick to Hoch Deutsch specific locations. Some places like Voralberg here in Austria are so different in dialect that the TV stations will put subtitles on. Check this out:http://youtu.be/yMmWJpxydqs?t=3m8s

Dual language books my also be a help - Here is an example on google books: http://books.google.at/books?printsec=frontcover&id=DX4BfdWEGbgC&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

Here is a link a good german paper - Die Zeit : http://www.zeit.de/index

Finally, the best investment I ever made was this book: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Collins-Easy-Learning-Grammar-Dictionaries/dp/0007252781

It has every grammar term, rule and table and it explains in simple language how and why they are used.

Hope that helped, any more questions feel free to ask.

finality

If you can afford it, do a euro languages college course this summer or next summer. REALLY helps with spoken German. At the end of fourth year my spoken German was quite bad and I felt really awkward speaking the language, after the course I was able to speak it comfortably. Being immersed in the language for a few weeks helps so much. The grammar was actually taught really well there too, especially the cases. I got 94% in my pre, without studying, just because of the fluency I gained from those courses (that said, it also comes quite naturally to me, not advising not studying :P)

DepoProvera

Am I missing any of the honours topics for the Bildergeschichten?
I have Altere/Junge Menschen; Rauchen; Stadt/Landleben; Sommerjobs and Schuleraustauch; Lernen zu zweit + Hausaufgaben usw......

Viken

DepoProvera wrote: »

Am I missing any of the honours topics for the Bildergeschichten?
I have Altere/Junge Menschen; Rauchen; Stadt/Landleben; Sommerjobs and Schuleraustauch; Lernen zu zweit + Hausaufgaben usw......

I can't think of anything else reasonable they might ask you... there're only one or two possible topics per picture sequence, unless the examiner plans on being a complete prick and trying to catch you out. So I believe you're safe with just those. Maybe "travelling" in general under the school exchange one, but you probably have that prepared anyway.

EDIT:I'm presuming that you plan on learning everything possible under each of those headings, ie "why youths smoke", "your opinion on part-time jobs"...if so, then I think you've got it covered.

leaveiton

DepoProvera wrote: »

Am I missing any of the honours topics for the Bildergeschichten?
I have Altere/Junge Menschen; Rauchen; Stadt/Landleben; Sommerjobs and Schuleraustauch; Lernen zu zweit + Hausaufgaben usw......

That all sounds about right. If you want I could PM you the questions we were given to prepare for each topic?

EDIT: Forgot the important part... the OP's question!

If you're listening to German radio/watching television/reading German then you're already doing really well. I'm still in 6th year so I can't speak as someone who's gotten an A1, but you seem to already have a massive advantage in that respect. The oral in German is handy enough, the roleplays and pictures are fairly easy to prepare beforehand and you're guaranteed 1 out of 5 in each case. Plus they're worth a lot of marks combined - 30 marks for the picture, 30 for the roleplay, and then 40 for general conversation. Because of the fact that you don't have as much time for the general conversation due to the pictures and roleplays, they don't tend to ask anything crazy. Talking to friends that do French, they have to learn a lot more for the conversation than you do in German. So the oral, in my opinion, is quite easy, and with some hard work you should be able to get nearly the full 25% in it

IloveConverse

jumpguy wrote: »

I did German in the LC and got an A2 (I know, not quite what you're looking for...but I was going for the A1 :P). As the above poster said, there really isn't much room for error. You have to be quite competent and confident in your German speaking, listening, comprehending and writing. That much is probably obvious!

One of my best friends is fluent in German and his entire family can all speak fluent German. He was doing his LC the same year, so we used to practice our German speaking a massive amount - especially in the run-up to the oral. It was absolutely great, and actually enjoyable learning German that way. I supplemented it with the tedious rote learnt vocab, grammar, phrases and so on, but I think I learnt the most and enjoyed German the most when learning it by speaking with a fluent speaker.

The oral, listening and comprehensions went very well, but unfortunately I was let down by my writing! When you're trying to write a letter, you kinda zone out of focussing on the grammar and stuff and go with instinct. Needless to say, my genders and cases (nominative, accusative, dative) were pretty poor. On top of the few marks I lost in the listening, oral and comprehensions (tough to get 100%) it dragged me down to an A2.

So perfecting your writing is really important for the A1, but if you manage to perfect your spoken German that'll cover the listening, oral, and will help a lot in the comprehensions too.

Good luck!

Brilliant advice, thank you very much.

Another poster has advised me to know the genders and cases inside-out also, as it's an integral part I will definitely focus on this area.

A friend of mine lives in Germany so we Skype each other- It's so helpful. It's amazing how quickly you pick up small phrases etc. She's doing the Abitur soon so it works well for both of us.

IloveConverse

Patricide wrote: »

My advice would be to watch shows and read papers/books in German. I myself didn't do German at all in school but it was how I picked it up when I moved to Germany. I looked at the exam tonight and it really didn't look too difficult last year, just make sure you know your grammar rules inside out(I wrote them all out and stuck them to the wall in front of me where my computer is).

If you have an android phone this app is very useful for on the go grammar exercises,

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=da.app.grammatiktrainer

I would also take advantage of the ANKI flashcard app to build up your vocabulary, it really improved mine in a short period of time.

If you don't have an android based phone, I found this website also very good. There is an entire online interactive German course on there from the very basics(A1 level) to mastery(C2).


Edit - Should also mention, if your travelling abroad or want to watch movies/series. Try to stick to Hoch Deutsch specific locations. Some places like Voralberg here in Austria are so different in dialect that the TV stations will put subtitles on. Check this out:http://youtu.be/yMmWJpxydqs?t=3m8s

Dual language books my also be a help - Here is an example on google books: http://books.google.at/books?printsec=frontcover&id=DX4BfdWEGbgC&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

Here is a link a good german paper - Die Zeit : http://www.zeit.de/index

Finally, the best investment I ever made was this book: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Collins-Easy-Learning-Grammar-Dictionaries/dp/0007252781

It has every grammar term, rule and table and it explains in simple language how and why they are used.

Hope that helped, any more questions feel free to ask.

Thank you sincerely for all your effort in putting this together.

The resources linked are fantastic and they'll definitely be used a lot for the LC and beyond.

Alles Gute.

Patricide

Oh by the way, I forgot one more resourse. Lang 8.com . It allows you to type out essays or what not and native speakers correct your work. I'd imagine this would be very beneficial to students, especially when teachers are already up the walls with work.