Hello everyone,
and welcome to week five of our German Summer Bootcamp and I know what you’re thinking.
“How long is this freaking bootcamp? I want to read about a word again.”
Well, I have good news for you. Today, is actually the penultimate workout session. So you almost made it.
Next time, to wrap things up, we’ll do an exercise for cases again.
And today, we’ll return to time land once again and do a little exercise for
Time Prepositions
So we’ll pratice saying stuff like two days ago, or in three weeks, or since yesterday or on Sunday.
This exercise is actually quite easy in comparison to the word order stuff we did last time. A2 students should be able to do okay.
But also if you’re an advanced learner, I recommenend you give it a shot. I mean… just because you think you know this stuff, doesn’t mean that you do ;).
And there are a few little things hidden that might be new to you. And you can of course do the translations for extra training.
So, is everybody ready?
Great, then let’s jump right in…
As usual, I’ll give you a statement or dialogue in English and you can translate it to German with the main focus being the proper time preposition.
Or, if translation is too difficult, you can click the little “?”, and you’ll get the German version with a gap and you just need to fill in the blank.
The solutions are in the audio and you can show then by clicking the circle O.
And if you want, you can type your version into the textfield so you can compare it with my translation.
Oh and I didn’t say it the last time, but the idea of this type of exericse is actually that you do it several times over a few days. Unless you get all correct, of course.
The first time is to find your weak points. Note down the stuff you didn’t know… on a piece of paper, with a pen, like in the olden days. Yes, generation Y and Z. You too. And yes, millennials, especially you!
So yeah… note down your weak points and then come back to the workout again a day later. Until you can just read the proper solution off the page.
Cool. So now without any further ago…uhm… I mean ado, let’s start. Viel Spaß :)
“That was decided many many years ago by the unicorn elves.”
“Das wurde ____ vielen vielen Jahren von den Einhorn-Elfen so entschieden.”
“Das wurde vor vielen vielen Jahren von den Einhorn-Elfen so entschieden.”
And, how was it? How did you do? Was it difficult or relatively easy? As always, I’m super curious for your feedback and for all your questions. So hop right over to the comment section and let’s talk.
I hope you all had fun and learned something. Have a great week and see you next time for the grand finale of the summer bootcamp. Tschau :)
Hello,
Let’s do a typo correcting workout first:
“the sword order stuff” (the word order stuff)
“just becaue you” (because)
“several time over a few days” (several times over a few days)
“millenials” (millennials)
“I haven’t showered for week” (a week… or weeks?)
Ok, I’ll do the workout this evening and then ask you whatever questions I have… BTW, when is part 5.2 in the time series coming up????
I’ve actually been studying time preps and all things time related, based on your series, and could do with the missing part ;)
Bis bald!
Oooph… you’re right. I’m sooooo overdue with that bit. I have to re-read part one actually, to check what’s missing :). Thanks for the nudge. I clearly need that (and more nudges)!
Quick question re Q14: Why “seit letzten Montag” and not “seit letztem Montag”?
Cheers :-)
Whops, you called me out. “letztem” is the correct form! This is a typical case where the way I speak carries over into how I write. I usually tend to keep such colloquialisms but this one is not an established enough a mistake so I’ll change it. And now I shall get to work and say “seit letzten Montag” until it becomes canon :D
Hi again,
Question 6 gives you the answer when you click on the question mark, question 24 gives you one of the 3 answers…
Apart from that, I got the rest right apart from Q11, which I can’t make sense of! Please explain it to me (Ich kann es an einem Tag machen), why “an”? Question 13 tripped me up, I answered “Ich habe für eine Stunde geduscht” duh!
I expected a question about that :).
The reason is simply that “Tag” takes the preposition “an” if we’re talking about the fact that something happens on one day.
– Ich schlafe am Tag.
– Ich mache das an einem Tag.
– Ich schlafe in einem Tag.
(this means I will sleep a day from now)
However, when we do the same with plural, things get unclear.
– Ich mache das an drei Tagen.
This can mean that I did something on three different days (like going to the gym) or that doing something took me three days.
– Ich mache das in drei Tagen.
This can mean that I’ll do it three days from now or within three days. Context has to clear it up here.
Hallo Emanuel,
Vielen vielen Dank für diesen Workout! Es hat mir sehr geholfen, die deutschen Satzstruktur besser zu verstehen :)
Super, das freut mich!!
How about Die Ubung wird in 5 Sekunden anfangen for number 1?
That’s prefectly fine as well, grammatically. In practice you wouldn’t use future for something THAT close unless you want to achieve a certain effect (like sounding official or formal or something similar)
Here are my areas of uncertainty.
5. vor 2
11. in einem Tag
12-14. I thought duschen was reflexive.
16. nachts
18. nach 10
22. vor 10
24. nachts und tagsüber
Übrigens:
“nach 10 uhr” – 1,600,000 results on google
“nach um 10 uhr” – 14,400 results on google
Oh yeah, and this one:
13. eine Stunde lang
Yup, works.
5. “vor zwei” works but it’s colloquial and to me it sounds better with “um”. But yeah, people do say it your way, too.
11. Actually, I just realized that my questions wasn’t clear. What I had in mind here is duration. So it’ll take me one day to do it.
That’s why it’s not “in” but “an”. With “in” in German, it would sounds like I’ll do it a day from now.
16. + 24. Yup, “nachts” and “tagsüber” work perfetcly and mean the same. I just didn’t use them because they’re not prepositions.
18.+22. : As I said earlier, using “um” sounds better to my ears, but that’s personal preference. Number 18 is a fictional note though. And in writing people would put “um” there.
hope that helps :)
Danke! What’s the difference between duschen and sich duschen?
With “sich duschen” you basically specify what you’re showering but context usually implies that so duschen and sich duschen are interchangeable.
– Ich gehe duschen.
– Ich gehe mich duschen.
Thise two are exactly the same.
vor um / nach um / bis um surprised me too. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that before.
Are you living in Germany (or have you lived here) ? If so, what region? Maybe it’s a regional thing and some parts of Germany really don’t use the “um” there…
I could read #11 two ways. – “in a day” could mean tomorrow, or it could mean that the task will take me one day to complete.
You’re right!! I didn’t realize, actually. In my head, I was thinking about completion and I was blinded to the other option.
Just want to say thank you, I am enjoying this course.
Vielen dank fur ihre Hart arbeite
Freut mich, zu hören! Danke für das liebe Feedback :)
I thought I was well into B1 but got almost all of these wrong! Thanks so much for this exercise and many others.
Hah… a gap exposed :). This isn’t that unusual actually. If you never really paid attention to talking about time, then you can just sort of cruise by.
It’s easy to fix though. Just go through the workout a few times over the coming weeks and you should be okay.
I am really struggling but I learn a little more with each exercise. Thank you :)
Hi Emanuel. And all people. I did it, almost all my questions were done by other people, so they were already answer.
But “to move in” isnt it “umziehen”? With um? And I thought it was reflexive too.
“umziehen” means “moving from A to B”. “einziehen” is about moving in, “ausziehen” is moving out. And if you add a location then you need no prefix at all.
– Ich ziehe nach Berlin.
All these are NOT reflexive. “sich umziehen” is about changing clothes :).
You can check out my article about “ziehen” for more details and examples
https://yourdailygerman.com/meaning-ziehen/
Man kann nur eine Sache sagen, dass Emanuel der beste Lehrer der Welt ist. danke Lehrer
Oh, danke dir auch :)! Du (und ihr alle) seid die besten Lerner!!
#24.
This summer I participated in the Pride Festival in Hamburg, where they passed out stickers: “I’ll be right back, just feeding my unicorn.” Made me think of you!
Also got one that says: MEHR GLITZER! which I think everyone could use, nicht wahr?
But… the environment! It should be decomposable Glitzer or no Glitzer ;)
The results:
As usual, I failed the translations miserably.
Best translation I did was #3 and even it was off:
Das Museum wird ab morgen wieder geöffnet.
Wish it had been more like yours.
I’m NOT going to bore you stiff with the other translations I did, seriously, posting them might launch a ICBM or something – they are THAT off…
As far as the correct fill-in-the-blanks after looking at the translations got all but #5 correct.
#5 wrote bevor instead of vor
Before I peeked at the translations I screwed up the following:
#10 just used drei Stunden lang.
#13 same – used eine Stunde lang.
#16 Einhörner jagen nachts.
But considering the translations I did were completely useless, I’m only counting the victory of filling in the correct preposition in each blank.
Beginning to have a nagging feeling that I’m never gonna manage German. Who cares about choosing the correct preposition when all the words around the prep are WRONG and in the WRONG ORDER?
Oh wow…. actually, could you post a few? Maybe I can see some kind of trend or pattern. Something that you mistranslate consisently. I mean… you’re doing so much work and on some level, your German is quite good. So I’m really confused that you fail so badly with the translations.
As for your “screw-ups”… those are not mistakes. They work just fine.
I just wanted to thank Emanuel for this awesome site and for giving me a scholarship (since i am currently unable to afford a membership by myself)! Also, a huge thanks for each and everyone of you guys who paid some more for the site, and know that your money is really helping people like me and promoting free education for everyone!
Hello, I would like to give a quick thank you for the members that helped me and other people get a membership im really happy to start learning german!
I did ok I guess, but not as well as I felt I should have done. It’s a little confusing, because for the answer ‘Ich muss vor um 10 zu Hause sein’ I just put ‘Ich muss vor 10 zu Hause sein’ – I didn’t learn that the ‘um’ has to be in the sentence. So if you say ‘It is 10 before 5’ it would just be ‘Es ist 10 vor 5’, no ‘um’ in there. Also, the one about the unicorn hunting, I put ‘nachts’ instead of ‘in der Nacht’ but I think both are acceptable. I am developing a general idea of how to structure a German sentence, but there are still too many words to remember and I can’t put them altogether yet. Not yet but I will keep trying!
I got Bis Morgen! Sound not working so took ages, aber was zum Teufel ist ein Einhorn-Elf
Wait, you can also read the solutions when you click the circle.
Are you using Firefox? Because Firefox won’t play, but it’s not really my site’s fault. I checked some forums already but it looks like there’s nothing I can do.
Would it be possible to post your boot camps all under one heading in the menu of your site, so they are easy to find? I would like to go back and re-work a few of them, and have had a hard time finding them all with “search”.
Thanks! They are great.
Yup!! I’ll do that! You’re definitely not the only one who has trouble finding them :)