How to Learn German: A Guide for Beginners 

I really hope this guy comes back, because many of the resources that I stumbled into and the names that he referenced in his videos have been people who have been unbelievably helpful to me in learning French, Greek and German. Doing three different lessons in review format, one time through (8), two times through (9), three times through (10), and now the current lesson (11) is absolutely genius. When I do this, I go back-and-forth between listening & reading simultaneously and reading out loud. When I read out loud, I’m going line by line and sentence by sentence, checking the notes and making sure I understand it, but the going back-and-forth allows me to get many readings, multiple listening, and the analysis done over the 20 or 25 minute period that I’m working on in the new lesson.

This guide is like a Godsent for me and it laid out the roadmap for at least my next two years... What a gem and how did I miss this masterpiece before?! I do hope you get back to RU-vid and complete the second video as well. You are a good human being mate.. Cheers from Stockholm

This is fantastic. I hope that more language enthusiasts begin to go as in depth with their methodology as you do. Thanks for the inspiration!

Hello and I appreciate your very valuable material here, obviously prepared not by some one with academical prejudices, but by some one directly from the field. I am a fan of your channel but it's been a long time since this video and I am expecting the video introducing the following material. And it would really be great if you can prepare a similar plan for French since I broke the learning order that you recommend by learning Latin first. Thank you very much again

What am I doing here? I AM german xD

Still waiting on the second video :(

Great advice! I used pretty much the same resources and strategy for learning French. For German (and many other languages) there is a series, very similar to Assimil, called "Méthode 90". Looking forward to more videos! Vale!

Thanks for this! Any plans to cover French and Italian?

It'd be great if you could do a video like this for learning Italian. I used Assimil while learning German (the French 'Sans Peine' and 'Perfectionnement') and can confirm that they're excellent learning methods, some of the very best. To perfect your grammar I would recommend Hammer's German Grammar; everything about German grammar is in there. Only recommended after you've reached an advanced level, though.

Each of those books has a number of editions, are there any specific editions you would recommend?

What would you think of substituting the FSI course for one of those 4?

Дорогой товарищ, ты лучший! На твой уровень создания видео можно и нужно равняться. Изложение структурированно и кратко, а советы -- неизменно рабочие и выверены опытным путём. Можем ли мы надееться на создание новых видео, в частности, продолжение к этому ролику, как было заявлено?

More than anything else, I have to credit the old Teach Yourself German by J. Adams and the old Hugo's Simplified System German in Three Months for my German. This wasn't all I used, but after this, I was more or less able to simply enjoy native materials. I did use Assimil, but I don't think I even bothered to finish it, if I recall correctly. I guess I'm more of a typical left-brained type.

Thank you so much

I bought your book today and have already started reading it . Thanks for sharing your personal language journey. - Judd

what do you think of glossika's courses? seems like something you would like with the bilingual sentences and being more modern.

anyone know where to get his book?

The newer version of Assimil German is better than the previous, in my opinion. Correct: 100 lessons in Assimil. 1-50: first wave, then you start the second wave and do 51->1, 52->2, 53->3, etc. Which will be 150 days. Also, Practice Makes Perfect for grammar.

Hi! Thanks for the video, such a great guide. Do you have any tips to improve the speaking skills (fluency and pronunciation)?

will you show us material for spanish?

да ты гений, Джо!

German Made Simple is what I am using, as far as straightforward textbooks go.

What happened to you? I really enjoyed the content

Я на 50 уроке assimil. Полёт нормальный =)

Many people would like to learn languages. But the structure and sequencing of most books or courses are self defeating. A woman fluent in 7 languages told me "your never going to learn a language the way your going" She said" your trying to learn the exact proper clauses and tenses,past,present and future to keep from sounding like someone uneducated or a child. You are trying to be technically correct, forget that. Just jump into the language, get immersed in it." She added "Your going to make mistakes, hundreds of them. You may blurt out something inappropriate or embarrassing but stay with it and the errors will gradually decrease and one day you will be comfortable and then you can focus on laws governing the language.'' Kids begin learning their native tongue as babies. From the context of the event or action they are involved in, they associate or connect the sound of words to activity. In their high chair at the kitchen table "hold your cup with both hands" "eat this green stuff it's good for you" "No No! don't throw mashed potatoes at your sister"" and they learn. You don't hear parents "" this is a spoon, a spoon is a noun, now eat. Remember eat, is a verb"". "" Now if you want desert conjugate me a sentence"". The technical debris, el,ella,usted, die,der,das etc should come after not before language instruction.

With all due respect, three of the books that you recommend here are terrible choices for learning German because they are so old and out of date. For example, the first lesson of the Berlitz Self-Teacher German says that the word for pen is die Feder. In fact, though, die Feder (literally "feather") means a quill pen. The word for a ballpoint pen is Kugelschreiber or Kuli and the general word for a writing instrument is a Stift. People in Germany will laugh at you if you ask them for a "Feder" to write with. Then, in the second lesson, it teaches you that the "der Rock" means "the coat." But this is not correct. A "Rock" is a skirt in German, not a coat. Rock is the sense of "coat" is an antiquated word used in some dialects. The standard meaning is "skirt." The book German Made Simple is also completely out of date. I recall that one of the characters visits a man in German (Herr Müller, I think) and is greeted at the door by the maid, who takes his hat and coat. That is not a reflection of life in modern Germany! It contains declension charts of the German definite article (der, die, das) as if it were teaching you Latin. That is not the most effective way of learning modern German. The Cortina method is also completely out of date. None of these books will teach you the words related to computers, cell phones, email, etc. that we use so often in everyday life because they were written so long ago. Nor do they teach you common expressions like "Tschüß" (meaning "goodbye"). In the case of the Berlitz book, it is not only old (written in the 1940s and published in 195) but actually contains erroneous vocabulary, as I explained above. You would do your listeners a favor by not recommending books that are outdated and inaccurate! I cannot comment on the Assimill book because I have not seen it, but the other three are so ridiculous that they are "indiskutabel" (beyond the pale).

Are you Behind the Meme?

hahaha I'm a native German speaker