Talk:German/Lesson 6

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This Lesson 5 is a real conglomeration of pieces contributed by several of the contributors. Although it may (from the Page History) appear that Marshman did most of the work, this was definitely not the case. I think this is one of the best lessons to date (February 2004) and is actually mostly the work of Hansm and SamE, with Marshman structuring their contributions. Unfortunately, that structuring (moving stuff aroud) gives me more credit than I'm due. Thanks guys - Marsh 04:03, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Okay, a minor local one (but a killer), a major local (text) and a major general (vocab):

1. "Gib mich es!" is shocking because it contradicts the rules for word order and indirect object from the previous lesson. Correct: "Gib es mir!"

2. I think we do have a problem with the vocabulary lists. All of them! They are absolutely correct. But only for a very specific context. For exampel: You can translate 'office' with German 'Sitz' - possibly. The banks have their main offices in Zurich and therefore it is their 'Sitz' (site of most important building). Now imagine a student on his fifth lesson in German doing his first free translation. He has to check up the German word for 'office' (in the sense of -white collar workspace-) to form a new sentence and turns to his true and trusted Wikibook vocabulary list. Let's say the sentence is "I will go to the office later today." -> "Ich werde später zum !Sitz! gehen." I don't think so. "Na, wie war es im !Sitz! heute?" No! The word he is looking for is 'Büro'.


 * That is the whole point. Each Vokabeln is NOT a partial German dictionary, but reflects exactly how the word or term is used in that lesson (in the material above the Vokabeln) with minor "the same" meanings. If the word is used later with a different meaning (or a different word is introduced with a similar meaning), then it is repeated in the new Vokabeln It is worth thinking about to have an appendix that does what you are suggesting. Each word in the lessons given as in a dictionary, wirth some more detail such as you give. - marsh 19:10, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I don't think we should burden expressions with highly specific meanings before their standard interpretations have been established.

3. I wonder if the introductory text is too difficult. There is a lot of grammar in it that has not been introduced yet (passive, irregular verbs, complex side clauses). And lot of fillers muddy the waters.


 * I do agree to the extent that as much as possible the introductory passages should be simplified or (if to difficult) moved to later in the book. This is a slow, on-going process and would be a messy one if whole passages were just thrown out.  In the beginning, it is impossible not to have grammar that hass yet to be introduced. To do so would require very preschool, then first grade, then 2nd grade, etc. apperoach to including passages.  The point uis whether the student can understand a passage given the vocabulary presented; not whether he can understand the grammar behind each sentence. Much of the latter is picked up in the review process: sentence grammar in Lesson 1 is suddenly obvious after the stuident returns from having done Lessons 2-4. - marsh 19:10, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I don't know what of these issues has been discussed before and what the consensus is. Help me out there, please!


 * Floflei6

Okay I will try to list some more doubts about the vocabulary

Take this one, No 5:

der Ausfluss           outlet, effluence (of a stream, river, or lake)  minor: only with lakes, with rivers it's 'Mündung' 
 * I will correct

das Ende               end  now, is it 'to end' or 'an end'?
 * It is in the "noun" section so it must be a noun.

das Haus               house verb or noun?
 * It is in the the noun section so it has to be a noun

der Sitz               office see above

nach Hause             to home ''' 'to home' is an infinitive for an English verb. The phrase 'nach Hause' is idiomatic: "Wir gehen nach Hause" or "Ich will nach Hause". The correct English translation would be "We go home" and "I want to go home". It is not "We go to home" or "Let's go to home" or "Do you fly to home tonight?" and so on. Therefore, word for word translation in the lists is not very feasible. In those cases we need phrases to demonstarte proper usage!'''
 * This should be done like this: nach Hause = (to) home

anrufen                call, telephone '''Is 'telephone here an equivalent of anrufen or a modifier for 'to call'? Obviously the latter. So, why not "jemanden anrufen     ->     to call someone on the telephone, to call"'''


 * it is in the "verb" section, so it must be the verb to telephone.
 * You should read the Introduction to the book as it explains this set-up of the vocabularies. Also, Lesson 1 emphasizes this again.  - marsh 19:21, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

kommen                 come ''' 'come' could be commandative form. I think infinitives need to be marked as such. '''

liegen (lag, gelegen)  lie (lay, lain)

am (an dem)            at the ''' How are people to know that prepositions plus articles can be contracted because that's what they need to know to get the point here. '''

bei                    in ''' Nope, 'bei' means 'near' or 'close to'. Then again it can mean a lot of other things, none of them is close to English 'in'. '''

beiden                 two ''' What happened to 'both'? Can you reverse it? 'Two' does not mean 'beide'. '''

gleichnamigen          same named ''' I am not an English native-speaker but 'same named' sounds a bit weird. '''

klein                  small ''' I love that case, because we had 'klein' already in an earlier unit and it meant 'short'. What now? '''

neben                  besides ''' Can you realy use 'besides' spatially? Shouldn't it be 'next to'? '''

nördlichen             northern schweiz                Swiss  'die nördliche Schweiz' 

I think the word for word vocabulary lists don't answer. We need to provide aditional information about function and use of expressions. Infinitives need to be marked as such. Nouns likewise. Words have to stripped of aspect, form and tense (not Dativ/Akkusativ 'beiden' but Nominaitiv 'beide'). If possible, translations should be mutually entailing and reversable - work both ways.

I think that's it for the moment.


 * Again, most of the problems you indicate come from your not reading the introduction and Lesson 1 examples of how the Vokabeln are set up. While everything you say is true, it would apply only if the Vokabeln were dictionary entries, which they are not. They were set up to be simple and not confuse the learning stuident with all of the other meanings, exceptions, etc.  As they are now is very straight-forward, simple, and useful for the lesson in which they appear. You are essentially taking them out of context, and then saying: "Look, there is no context here" The context is there.  Irt is just not obvious when you jump into Lesson 4 from having not read all that went before - marsh 19:21, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)


 * Floflei6

"Mutti sagt Hallo." is nonsens! -> deleted --217.231.147.46 17:56, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)
 * Such actions are not the least bit helpful. You can correct the statement to "good" German, but your calling it "nonsense" is nonsensical - marsh 04:28, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
 * sorry, but there is realy NO SENSE in this sentence. Do you want to say somthing like: "Ich soll dich von Mutti grüßen."?--217.231.132.9 06:58, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
 * Yes, but is there an easier way to say that (mine was just a direct English formulation, obviously) since at this point in the text modals are complications. - marsh 17:26, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
 * OK, what's about: "Mutti grüßt dich."? I wouldn't say this, but it's correct --217.231.137.143 23:25, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
 * Danke. We can use that until something better comes along - marsh