Skip to main content

REGULAR PRESENT VERBS

REGULAR PRESENT VERBS




Regular present tense verbs follow orderly patterns which change the endings for their infinitive form words. In German, regular present tense verbs follow either the same or an easy to learn ending arrangement of letter/s, which makes it more acquirable to get the right present tense ending and understand the proper context.

1st person singular (ich)
-e
ich lerneI learn
2nd person singular (du)
-st
du lernstyou learn
3rd person singular (er/sie/es)
-t
er lernthe learns
1st person plural (wir)
-en
wir lernenwe learn
2nd person plural (ihr)
-t
ihr lerntyou learn
3rd person plural/polite form (sie/Sie)
-en
sie lernen

(table from Deutsch Lingolia and modified by me, details in bibliography).
For example 1: the infinitive form of stehen in 3rd person singular changes to "er/sie/es steht".
Example 2: the infinitive form of singen 2nd person plural changes to "ihr singt".

The present tense verbs of 2nd person singular, 3rd person singular and 2nd person plural can vary slightly in the ending depending on their stem by adding an extra letter. If the end of the stem has a -M, -T or -D stem letter, then an extra -E is added to the stem word.The extra letter is added because without the extra letter saying the verb would be awkward, for example: arbeiten in 2nd person plural would sound and feel awkward to say "arbeitst", which is what is should be, but because arbeiten has the stem letter -T then it adds an extra -E so that it doesn't sound off. Below is a table that will help give a visual representation, the highlighted letters are the stem letters that add an -E to the endings of 2nd person singular, 3rd person singular and 2nd person plural.




ENGLISH MEANING
INFINITIVE FORM
2nd PERSON SINGULAR
3rd PERSON SINGULAR
To find
finden
Du findest
Er/Sie/Es findet




To wait
warten
Du wartest
Er/Sie/Es wartet
Example 1: du findest.
Example 2: ihr arbeitet.





BIBLIOGRAPHY
Collins Dictionaries. (2016). Easy learning german verbs. 2nd ed. [Place of publication not identified]: HarperCollins Publishers.
Deutsch.lingolia.com. (2017). Present Tense (Präsens) - Lingolia German. [online] Available at: https://deutsch.lingolia.com/en/grammar/tenses/present-tense [Accessed 5 Aug. 2017].

The German Professor. (2017). The present tense of German verbs - The German Professor. [online] Available at: http://www.thegermanprofessor.com/present-tense-verbs/ [Accessed 9 Aug. 2017].

Dingle, M. and Sedunary, M. (1997). Feuerwerk. Port Melbourne, Victoria: CIS Heinemann.

Deutsch.lingolia.com. (2017). Present Tense (Präsens) - Lingolia German. [online] Available at: https://deutsch.lingolia.com/en/grammar/tenses/present-tense [Accessed 9 Aug. 2017].

Learn English | British Council. (n.d.). present tense. [online] Available at: https://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/english-grammar/verbs/present-tense [Accessed 8 Aug. 2017].








































ENGLISH MEANING
INFINITIVE FORM
2nd PERSON SINGULAR
3rd PERSON SINGULAR
To find
finden
Du findest
Er/Sie/Es findet
To bless
segnen
Du segnest
Er/Sie/Es segnet
To wait
warten
Du wartest
Er/Sie/Es wartet











Comments

Popular posts from this blog

GERMAN PREPOSITIONS

GERMAN PREPOSITIONS A preposition is a word that shows the relationship of a noun or a pronoun to some other word in the sentence. Some examples of prepositions in German are  mit  (with),  durch  (through),  für  (for),  seit  (since).  The noun/pronoun which the preposition modifies will always be in either the accusative , dative or genitive case.  Most prepositions are placed before the noun/pronoun that they modify, however, some are placed after.  PREPOSITIONAL CASES There are three prepositional cases: accusative , dative , and genitive . There is also a group of prepositions that can take on either the accusative or dative case, depending on the meaning of the sentence. Commonly used prepositions such as  durch (through), für (for), um (around)  always take on the accusative , whereas other common prepositions such as  bei (by/next to), mit (with), von (from/of), zu (to/at)  will always take the  dative case. The following chart can be used to find out whether a

SUBORDINATE CONJUNCTIONS

SUBORDINATE CONJUNCTIONS  Subordinate conjunctions is one of two types of conjunctions . A conjunction is a word that joins two phrases or ideas into one sentence. The other form of conjunction is coordinate conjunctions, which unlike subordinate conjunctions doesn't affect the sentence structure. Coordinate conjunctions include und, aber and oder.   Subordinate conjunctions are very common and useful and are always used the same way. A subordinate conjunction is used to join two clauses to make one sentence. After the subordinate conjunction in a sentence the verb always moves to the end of the sentence . There must always be a comma directly in front of a subordinate conjunction . An example of a subordinate conjunctions role: Example 1 “you can borrow a book” “you asked me” “Du kannst ein Buch ausleihen . Du hast mich gefragt .” Example 2 - with a subordinate conjunction: “You can borrow a book, because you asked me .” “ Du kannst ein

Separable Verbs

Separable Verbs   In German, prefixes can be added to the start of  a verb,  in order to  change the verb’s meaning. These verbs  can  have inseparable prefixes, where the  prefix stays attached to the verb in all cases, or separable prefixes, where the prefix moves to the end of the sentence or phrase in some cases.    Present Tense   For  example,   in the sentence   ‘ Ich   sehe  sehr gut  aus ’    Aussehen is the verb, and since the sentence is in present tense, the prefix ‘aus’ is  moved to the very end of the sentence.   Another example is   ‘ Ich  trete   einem  Klub  bei ’   In this sentence ,  b e i treten  is the verb, and as it is in present tense, the prefix is  sent to the end of the sentence.    Past Perfect   In past perfect tense,  the prefix stays at the beginning of the verb, and ‘ge’ is added between the prefix and the verb   For example,   ‘ Ich habe  sehr gut aus ge sehen   In this sentance,  aussehen is