Best children german language books according to redditors
We found 21 Reddit comments discussing the best children german language books. We ranked the 8 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 21 Reddit comments discussing the best children german language books. We ranked the 8 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
Norwegian shares some with both Swedish and Danish, so it's a nice pick for understanding at least a bit of those. It's also quite easy for English speakers to learn, on par with Swedish and maybe just a touch easier.
For learning resources, check the sidebars of specific subreddits like /r/norsk and /r/svenska, and/or ask in there. But for Norwegian I really like Norwegian: An Essential Grammar, and I used the Pimsleur course.
So essentially you want to buy hardcopy books in German from amazon.com, right?
Any particular reason why? A lot of old books where copyright is no longer an issue are available for free over the net, either in pdf-file, html or e-book format.
I prefer actual hardcopy books myself, but the ease of getting classics for free is just too good to pass up.
>I've been searching classics (Of Mice and Men, Grapes of Wrath) just because I figured they would be dubbed already.
If you want to read classics, I would strongly suggest you pick up some German classics.
Some phrases, expressions and puns are difficult to translate and for this reason I prefer reading a book in its original language. I haven't touched a translation of a book from English into German for ages.
Look into the syllabus of what German students are supposed to read during their last years of school.
Der Schimmelreiter- Storm
http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/buch/der-schimmelreiter-3488/1
Das kalte Herz - Wilhelm Hauff
http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/buch/-5743/4
Woyzeck - Blücher
Im Westen nichts Neues - Remarque
Nackt unter Wölfen - Bruno Apitz
Der Laden - Strittmatter
Effi Briest - Fontane
http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/buch/effi-briest-4446/1
Or for something more recent and less heavy:
Tintenherz , Tintenblut, Tintentod - Funke
Russendisko - Wladimir Kaminer
Das fliegende Klassenzimmer - Erich Kästner
Emil und die Detektive - Erich Kästner
Biene Maja
http://www.amazon.com/Biene-Maja-Ihre-Abenteuer-German/dp/1452826048/
Der kleine Vampir
http://www.amazon.com/Kleine-Vampir-German-Angela-Sommer-Bodenburg/dp/3499202166/
I have been having a lot of luck with Urdu: An Essential Grammar, which is very broad in its treatment.
I would also advise anyone to check out Urdu: An Essential Grammar's Farsi (and Arabic) grammar of Urdu section.
Routledge makes excellent and comprehensive grammar books
If you really want a traditional textbook though, I think Kontakte is pretty good.
I know nothing about Greek, but for Urdu I have Teach Yourself Urdu by David Matthews and Mohamed Kasim Dalvi. I think it's a pretty good book. However, I would not try to learn the script from it. Get Teach Yourself Read and Write Urdu Script for that. A friend of mine also had good things to say about Let's Study Urdu by Ali Asani. She also really liked Urdu: An Essential Grammar. I haven't used that, but I have use the Essential Grammar book for Hindi and thought it was pretty well-written. There is also Darvazah: A Door into Urdu, but unfortunately certain parts of the site don't seem to work.
If you're into it, you could also learn Devanagari (Hindi script) and then you'd have access to Hindi learning materials as well (Hindi and Urdu are VERY similar- most deviation is in vocab and grammar is mostly the same). I could give you some recommendations for Hindi too if you're interested.
First of all, you'll find that there are two different writing standards for Norwegian, Bokmål and Nynorsk. You will almost certainly want to learn Bokmål, the most common. There are also a wide range of regional dialects; you will almost certainly want to learn Standard Østnorsk. It's nothing to worry about, as Bokmål and Østnorsk are almost always the ones taught to foreigners, but do be aware that you will find Norwegian that doesn't conform to what you've learnt.
As for somewhere to start, I'd suggest Norwegian on the Web, a basic introductory course covering grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary, built up little by little in each of ten chapters. To have a minimal understanding of pronunciation you will need to read up to at least chapter 6; for grammar at least chapter 8.
I know you say you can't really sink money into it, but in my opinion the most valuable book, if you were to buy one, is Norwegian: An Essential Grammar. Most of your Norwegian learning can be done on the Internet, but I've not really found another decent reference for more complex Norwegian grammar. That can wait, though.
You'll probably also be recommended Teach Yourself Norwegian at some point, but in my honest opinion I don't think that's a particularly good book, especially considering the free courses you can find online. Just make sure to use a course from a reputable source — there are guides written by non-natives that are misleading or just plain wrong.
Once you get past the level expected for courses, you can try having a go with actual Norwegian text and speech, perhaps beginning with resources for people who are still learning Norwegian, like Klar Tale and SkoleTV.
Lykke til!
Hi there, This book is the one I'm using. I would also switch all your online accounts to bokmål (if possible) and perhaps install a Norwegian proxy so you can watch dagbladet and nrk videos.
These two sentences mean the exact same thing, and they absolutely are both standard Norwegian, although you would definitely hear the second one being used the most in spoken Norwegian.
 
As for commas, the first one should indeed have a comma before for as it is a coordinating conjunction (as are og and men, among others), although there should be no comma in front of the fordi in the second sentence, as it is a subordinating conjunction. I suggest you go read up on the differences coordinating and subordinating conjunctions (including subordinating clauses).
 
If you're willing to spend a bit of money, two good books I would recommend are Norwegian: An Essential Grammar or Norsk grammatikk.
I just remembered something else. There's a series of books, they look like kids' books, but they're for vocabulary so it doesn't really matter. Amazon has them in a bunch of different languages, and I think they're great. The German one is here. It's your first 1000 words in German, and it covers almost every possible part of life. As well as colors and numbers, it shows animals, city life, country life, rooms in your home...I think they're indispensable when learning a new language. (I'm a wannabe polyglot!)
I can wholeheartedly recommend the Lagune series:
http://www.amazon.de/Lagune-Deutsch-Fremdsprache-Kursbuch-Audio-CD/dp/3190016240
There are several levels, audio cds, workbooks and even teacher guidelines if you want those too.
I recommend this book, it has done wonders for me.
Also, Duolingo does explain the grammar (not very extensively, admittedly), are you reading the blurbs each skill has?
Yes! As for books these one's have really helped me:
I know I have more but these are my favorites! As for movies/shows.. when I watch like youtube videos (try 'easy german') or kids shows I tend to watch them without subtitles. If I'm watching an adult movie/show I pretty much have to use subtitles otherwise I can't pick up anything. I usually put the subtitles in German though, because I read better than I listen!
Let me know if I can help you with anything else :)
I found this reference grammar book very helpful understanding the grammar while I was learning Urdu.
It has Roman alphabet transliterations throughout the book so it's good for you if you are unfamiliar with Urdu alphabet.
Also what I like about this book is that it has short sections dedicated to Persian and Arabic elements used in Urdu. As you probably already know, Urdu has a lot of loanwords from Arabic and Persian and basically that makes it a lot different from Hindi. From my experience it would give you a head start if you have any knowledge on these two languages. So if your target language is Urdu and not Hindi, I recommend you to take a brief look at the languages that influenced Urdu.
I've been using this for sometime.
http://www.amazon.com/Learn-Your-Car-Complete-Individual/dp/1560151390
You can also find it on Youtube, just search for "Learn in your Car German"
I highly recommend Lagune 1. Make sure to get the workbook and remaining Audio CDs as well.
If what you want to achieve is A1 and nothing beyond, you best bet would be getting one of the many course books:
A arguably better alternative would be the free online course offered by Deutsche Welle (http://deutschkurse.dw.de/KursPlattform/WebObjects/KursPlattform.woa/wo/6.1). Do register and try it. Really valuable resource. Together with Deutsch – warum nicht? (http://www.dw.de/deutsch-lernen/deutsch-warum-nicht/s-2163) you can go far. (In case you didn't realise already, both the sound files and pdf notes can be found on the right, featuring four series.)
Maybe the only problem you would encounter is speaking. The speaking test is actually like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGNd-6pDkEI), and you may panic if you don't already speak in German for a several hours. Try to find someone who speaks German and wants to do a language exchange with you. (http://www.language-exchanges.org/) is one of them. You may as well find one on Reddit.
By the way, if you really want to have a strong command of German sooner or later, there are some good, though popular (popular doesn't always mean bad) books for foundation, apart from your already awesome German for Reading:
If you insist on getting a grammar book, a nice start would be:
And eventually you may want to take down the boss:
Finally I recommend you to take a look at my favourite reading material when I started, Studien und Plaudereien (http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22160), freely offered by Project Gutenberg.
Here are some things I found on amazon:
Vocabulary:
Grammar (and Vocabs):
There are also some good allrounders from the publisher „PONS“ or „Langenscheidt“
Why Urdu and not Hindi? I'm not saying it's a bad idea to learn Urdu, but there are so, so many questions that are raised. Do you want to learn to write it as well? With whom will you speak? After all, learning a language is usually a means, not an end. Does anyone in your family know Urdu? Do you watch lots of Bollywood movies, or do you like the music of someone like Atif Aslam? Do you already speak Panjabi or Pashto? Maybe, Baloch or Sindhi?
It's totally fine if you answer "no" to all these questions. In fact, if you DO answer no to them all, then your desire to learn Urdu is all the more intriguing.
Do you speak any other languages?
Last question:
Do you already have an ear for it? You can't learn Urdu on Duolingo. You CAN go to Amazon and buy Ruth Laila Schmitt's Essential Urdu Grammar. If you pair that with 1) passion, 2) lots of Bollywood (it's Hindi, I know, but it's ear training), 3) some music, and 4) friends who will indulge your nascent attempts to communicate, then you just might succeed.