Customer Reviews

Berlitz Basic German (Workbook Series , Level 1) (German Edition)

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My German skills learnt through three years at school, never expecially strong and all the worse for a five year lapse, were exposed as the poor excuse they were during a two week trip to Deutschland two years ago. This book (and a handful of others) was supposed to be part of the attempt to restore my self esteem.

However, this book just doesn't help if you're trying to recover the basics of the grammar with almost no vocabulary to work from - it isn't that sort of book. Almost half of the time completing the very very simple exercises is spent thumbing through the dictionary to find the masc/fem/neuter of a noun. And they are *very* simple exercises - you're not looking at getting fluent in a hurry here. And it's frustrating.

What's needed (and I found in Adrienne Penner's basic Gimmick book) is a drilling in each incremental part of the language as you're learning, to teach each aspect and test it to make sure it's learnt.

Instead, you're still working on basic adjectives halfway through the book (page 54, to be precise), with no real expanse in vocabulary or grammatical understanding.

To be fair, this book is probably a lot more useful to people learning at school the first time around, with support. It's likely to hold the attention of a child or young adult a lot longer than dry drills, but ultimately if you just want to get on and rebuild your skills, this isn't the book for you.

Good luck!

I have used this book as a complement to my German language studies and has proven very useful to increase vocabulary. I am using this book by myself at home, working on the unit of the topic I learn at school and I really get new words. It contains fun activities like unscramble the words, search-a-word, puzzles and some exercises to review grammar like completing the dialogs, finding mistakes, and also reading comprehension exercises with questions, true or false, etc. At the back of the book it contains a short summary of different grammar topics with examples to help you solve any doubts you might encounter while answering the book and of course you have the answer key to make sure you are doing fine. It is divided in different units which cover different topics like food, family, nationalities, meeting people, finding your way out, around the city, telling the hour, etc.

I really disagree with the other reviewers because at least for me as a beginner student it has been really helpful (and fun!)

I studied German for 2 years in highschool and spent 3 months in Northern Germany where I spoke Deutsch every day! Yet, I find this book confusing and difficult. I wish I had never purchased this book. It has been a frustrating waste of money.