Coffee Break German Lesson 02 Study Notes Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 1 of 13
LESSON NOTES GUTEN TAG, WIE HEISSEN SIE? In this second lesson of our course we ll learn to greet people at different times of the day. We will also learn how to ask the question What is your name? and give suitable answers. INTRODUCTION Thomas and Mark began the lesson with a short conversation which used some of the phrases covered in the last lesson: Thomas: Hallo Mark. Wie geht s dir heute? Mark: Mir geht s gut, danke. Wie geht s? Thomas: Mir geht s auch gut, danke. There are a few points we can pick up from this conversation. heute today When Thomas asks Mark wie geht s dir heute? he is asking, how are you today? Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 2 of 13
auch also, too, as well Thomas said, mir geht s auch gut, meaning I m also feeling well. If you wanted to say I m also feeling bad you could say mir geht s auch schlecht. LASS UNS ANFANGEN! This is the phrase Thomas uses at the beginning of the lesson which means, let s go, or let s get started. anfangen to start, to begin lass uns... let us... REVIEW CONVERSATION To help consolidate the words and phrases covered in the previous lesson, Mark and Thomas begin with a conversation. The conversation contains a few new elements of vocabulary. Study the conversation below and review the accompanying vocabulary. Thomas: Guten Morgen, Mark. Mark: Guten Morgen, Thomas. Wie geht s? Thomas: Sehr gut, danke. Wie geht es dir? Mark: Mir geht s schlecht. Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 3 of 13
Thomas: Das ist schade. Mark: Auf Wiedersehen. Thomas: Tschüss. wie geht es dir? how are you? This is the full version of this phrase: in wie geht s, the two words geht es are shortened to geht s. Note also the use of the word dir which literally means to you. Compare mir geht s gut, meaning to me it goes well. Mir means to me, and dir means to you (informal). So wie geht es dir? literally means how is it going to you? das ist schade that is a shame Thomas explained that wie geht s dir is an informal way of asking how are you? Just as in French, Spanish and many other languages, there is an informal and formal form of you. Where French has tu and vous and Spanish has tú and usted, German has du and Sie. We ll learn more about these forms in the next lesson. For now, focus on the formal version of wie geht es dir?: wie geht es Ihnen? how are you? (formal) Remember, this literally means how is it going to you (formal)? So the word Ihnen means to you (formal). GREETINGS FOR DIFFERENT TIMES OF THE DAY We ve already learned the phrase for good morning, guten Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 4 of 13
Morgen. Some other greetings are presented below: guten Tag good day / good afternoon Guten Tag literally means good day, but it s generally used for the time between Morgen and Abend ( evening - see below). guten Abend good evening gute Nacht good night You will notice that guten Morgen, guten Tag, and guten Abend all use the word guten to mean good, but gute Nacht has a different form of the word for good. This is explained further by Kirsten, our Grammar Guru. GRAMMAR GURU Grammar is what holds the words and phrases of a language together. While Thomas teaches you the words and phrases in German, I ll be here to explain why all the words and phrases have been put together that way, breaking it down and giving you little hints and tips along the way so that you can start making your own sentences in German. We ve seen four greetings, one for each time of day: guten Morgen, guten Tag, guten Abend and gute Nacht. You will Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 5 of 13
already have noticed that gute Nacht is the odd one out here, because it s the only one where we say gute and not guten. The word gut is an adjective, and adjectives in German, just like in French, Spanish, and many other languages, change their ending, depending on the word they are describing. You re probably thinking that the word Nacht is somehow guten gute Morgen Tag Abend Nacht different from Morgen, Tag, and Abend - and you d be right! These four words are nouns, and nouns in German, again, just like in French and Spanish, have grammatical gender. Nacht has a different gender from the other three, and that is why we have guten Morgen, guten Tag and guten Abend, but gute Nacht. We will explain this in more detail in a future lesson, but you may be interested to know that Morgen, Tag and Abend are all masculine nouns, and Nacht is feminine. You may well have lots of questions, and that s a good thing! By asking questions when learning a language, you understand the language in more depth. However we ll be coming back to the topic of grammatical gender and indeed adjectives later in the series, so we ll leave things there for just now. Lots of little steps will eventually take you far! I hope I ve helped solve one little mystery about these greetings. INTRODUCING YOURSELF AND ASKING OTHER PEOPLE WHAT IS YOUR NAME? To ask someone what is your name in the formal form, use: Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 6 of 13
wie heißen Sie? what is your name? (formal) You will recognise wie from the question wie geht s? It literally means how, so the question wie heißen Sie literally means how are you called? Note also the ß in the word heißen. This was explained in the bonus vocabulary section of lesson 1. To answer the question wie heißen Sie, you can used the following expression: ich heiße... I am called... An alternative way to give your name is by using the literal translation of my name is... : mein Name ist... my name is... Note that since Name is a noun (just like Morgen, Abend, Nacht, etc.) it begins with a capital letter. CULTURAL CORRESPONDENT In today s report I m going to be looking at where German is actually spoken. Do have a look at the map overleaf to help you understand where I m talking about! German is of course the official language of Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 7 of 13
Germany, Switzerland and Austria, but it s also an official language in Belgium, along with French and Flemish; in Luxembourg, where it shares its official status with French and Luxembourgish; and in the tiny principality of Liechtenstein on the border between Austria and Switzerland. So, as a German learner, you ll be glad to know that the language you re learning is spoken in many parts of Europe, but that s not all! Did you know German-speaking countries in Europe. Shown in red (clockwise): Germany, Austria, Switzerland. Arrows from north to south point to Belgium, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein. Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 8 of 13
that there over five million speakers of German living in the US? There are also huge communities of German-speakers in Brazil and Argentina. German is the third most-taught language in the English-speaking world, after French and Spanish, and as a native English speaker you re going to find that it s quite easy to learn German, because historically English and German belong to the same language family. In fact, hundreds of years ago, people speaking older forms of German and English could probably understand each other, and many words between the two languages are similar. We ve already heard examples of this in our lessons. UNTIL THE NEXT TIME... The final phrase introduced in this lesson was until the next time : bis zum nächsten Mal until the next time / see you next time We will see further examples of the word bis in the bonus vocabulary section. ONE MORE THING... Did you happen to notice the title of this lesson? On the first page we listed the title as: GUTEN TAG, WIE HEISSEN SIE? Good day. What is your name? Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 9 of 13
The key point to notice here is that the graphic design of these lesson notes uses capitals for headings. However, we have seen in the content of the lesson that the word heißen is written with the Eszett, ß. It is important to know that when writing in upper case it is normal to use SS for ß. Indeed, in Switzerland, ss is always used instead of ß. Well done if you spotted this use of ss in the title! Ready for more? Turn the page to continue with the bonus materials for this lesson. Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 10 of 13
BONUS MATERIALS In each edition of Coffee Break German we cover the basic language you need to communicate. As part of the study pack we provide some additional vocabulary to help you increase your range of expression. This section of bonus materials provides additional content to help you master the words and phrases contained in the lesson. Start with the Bonus audio lesson, our review podcast Review the Core Vocabulary and learn the Bonus Vocabulary CORE VOCABULARY lass uns anfangen let s get started, let s begin wie geht es dir? how are you? (informal) wie geht es Ihnen? how are you (formal) heute today guten Morgen good morning guten Tag good day; good afternoon Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 11 of 13
guten Abend good evening gute Nacht good night wie heißen Sie? what is your name? ich heiße... I m called... mein Name ist... my name is... bis zum nächsten Mal until the next time BONUS VOCABULARY einen schönen Abend (have) a nice evening bis nächste Woche until next week / see you next week bis später until later / see you later bis bald see you soon Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 12 of 13
schlaf gut sleep well. Note that schlaf gut is the informal version which you would use to a family member, for example. Coffee Break German: Lesson 03 - Notes page 13 of 13