Lesson 1 - Statements, Verben, Conjugations

1.1 Statements

When we want to say a sentence in German, we need to know who does something, what action that person takes, and often who or what receives that action.

Example: You open the app.

You do the action, the action is to open, and what you open is the app.

This describes what we do here at News in Slow German:

Wir lesen die Nachrichten. We read the news. Who is doing something? Wir - we. What are we doing? Lesen - we read. And what is it we are reading? Die Nachrichten - the news.

Let’s start with the subject of the sentence, the who - who does something. We can use names. If we do, we are very specific about the who.

Gisela und Johann lesen die Nachrichten.

1.2 Personal Pronouns

If we don’t want to be specific, or if we want to speak about ourselves, we need to use pronouns.

You can think of pronouns as substitute words for someone’s name.

If Gisela speaks about the fact that she reads the news, she says “Ich lese die Nachrichten”. She substitutes the pronoun ich (I) for her name.

We have nine possibilities for this in German: eight people and one inanimate object.

Here are the pronouns with the English translations. Take a look at these first eight pronouns and see what you already know.

Personalpronomen (Personal Pronouns)

ich	I	wir	we
du	you	ihr	you all
er	he	sie	they
sie	she
es	it

Look at the first column on the left: ich, du, er, sie, es. What do these all have in common?

These are all singular pronouns: I, you, he, she, it. Each one is a singular individual, or, in the case of es, an inanimate object, like the book (das Buch).

Now look at the following three pronouns: wir, ihr, sie. None of them is on the singular side; these three are plural pronouns: we, you all (plural you, i.e. y’all, you lot), and they.

We have one more pronoun to add to that table: the formal form of you.

1.2.1 Sie und du

German has two forms of you. Sie is the formal you, the form you would use when speaking to someone like a shopkeeper, your doctor, and your mechanic. In this case it is singular.

However, it can also be plural if you formally address several people. Think of the plural Sie like this: You go to visit your German doctor and you speak with her and the nurse at the same time. In this case, you would use the plural Sie.

Du is the informal you, the form of you you would use when you speak with family and friends.

Note: The formal Sie is always capitalized.

1.3 Verb Conjugations

With all of these options open, we can now talk about people reading the news.

Conjugations of the verb lesen

Ich lese die Nachrichten.	I read the news.	Wir lesen die Nachrichten.	We read the news.
Du liest die Nachrichten.	You read the news.	Ihr lest die Nachrichten.	You all read the news.
Er liest die Nachrichten.	He reads the news.	Sie lesen die Nachrichten.	They read the news.
Sie liest die Nachrichten.	She reads the news.	Sie lesen die Nachrichten.	You read the news.

Did you notice how the form of the verb changes depending on who is reading?

Ich lese die Nachrichten. Du liest die Nachrichten. Wir lesen die Nachrichten.

This is called conjugation. Conjugating a verb means to change it to match the person/people who is/are the subject(s).
Read through the table above again and note the verb endings. You will also notice that there is a vowel change in the 2nd and 3rd singular forms; this is a common occurrence:

Ich lese die Nachrichten.	Wir lesen die Nachrichten.
Du liest die Nachrichten.	Ihr lest die Nachrichten.
Er liest die Nachrichten.	Sie lesen die Nachrichten.
Sie liest die Nachrichten.	Sie lesen die Nachrichten.

Note: You probably noticed that there are three forms of sie in German. They can be hard to tell apart, and there are two elements to look for:

• The first is the verb conjugation ending in -t (for the singular sie as in she) and the verb conjugation ending in -en (for the plural sie as in they and the singular Sie as in the formal you).
• The second is context. When it comes to sie (they) and Sie (you), which have the same verb endings, sometimes you will have to look at the context to differentiate.

Frequently, sie/Sie appear in the same part of the grammar table, see below.

Many verbs don't have vowel changes, for example trinken, to drink. You only see the endings change. These are called regular verbs.



Conjugations of the verb trinken

ich trinke	wir trinken
du trinkst	ihr trinkt
er trinkt sie trinkt	sie/Sie trinken


You might enjoy a coffee (Kaffee) or a tea (Tee) while you read, in which case you can now say:



Ich lese die Nachrichten. Ich trinke Kaffee. or Ich lese die Nachrichten. Ich trinke Tee.


In the news, you will frequently read about another person or several people doing something:



Gisela liest die Nachrichten und trinkt Tee. Johann liest die Nachrichten und trinkt Kaffee. Gisela und Johann lesen die Nachrichten. Sie trinkt Tee, und er trinkt Kaffee.