2.1 Meine Familie

Guten Tag!

Let’s warm up with our Tagesminiplausch und Wiederholung.

Wiederholung

Today, we will begin with a review of colors.

Now, we will review the variety of questions, statements, and responses you have learned so far.

Jetzt bist du dran!

Imagine you are on a train in Germany, traveling from Stuttgart to Frankfurt, and you begin talking to the German seated next to you. Write out your dialogue in your journal and/or meet with a classmate and record your dialogue in your audio journal.

 

While we’re at it, let’s review the numbers.

Die Zahlen (null bis zwanzig)

0 null
1 eins 6 sechs 11 elf 16 sechzehn
2 zwei 7 sieben 12 zwölf 17 siebzehn
3 drei 8 acht 13 dreizehn 18 achtzehn
4 vier 9 neun 14 vierzehn 19 neunzehn
5 fünf 10 zehn 15 fünfzehn 20 zwanzig

 

Lektionsüberblick

In this lesson, we will talk about family. In the end, you will be able to 1) say how big your family is, 2) list the members of your nuclear family, and 3) list which family members you do not have.

1) Say how big your family is

Look at Sofia’s introduction below. Then, answer the questions in the question set below.

Now, listen to Adan describe his family. Can you tell if his family is groß (big), klein (small), or maybe somewhere in the middle (mittelgroß)? Follow along with the transcript if you’d like.

 


Adan says his family is “nicht so groß.” Another way to say that is, Adans Familie ist mittelgroß or perhaps even klein. Now look at the images and descriptions below.

Dads with son

 

 a medium-sized family a big family
Eine kleine Familie Eine mittelgroße Familie Eine große Familie

Jetzt bist du dran!

Consider your immediate family. Is it big, small, medium-sized? Now, write a complete sentence that describes the size of your family.
Now record this in German in your audio journal. If you can do it immediately without reading, that’s great! Otherwise, practice saying it a couple times before recording. Or rerecord, if you are not satisfied.

 

2) Say which people belong to your nuclear family

Read Carlos’ introduction and answer the questions that follow.

Now, listen and read about Johannes and answer the questions that follow.

Johannes Hallo! Mein Name ist Johannes. Ich bin 16 Jahre alt. Ich komme aus Stuttgart. Meine Familie ist sehr groß. Ich habe eine Mutter und einen Vater und drei Geschwister, einen Bruder und zwei Schwestern. Meine Mutter heißt Anja. Mein Vater heißt Sven.

 

Who is in your nuclear family? Do you have siblings (Geschwister)? Do you have a brother (einen Bruder)? Do you have a sister (eine Schwester)? Look at the example sentences below. What do you notice?

Ich habe eine große/kleine Schwester Ich habe 2 große/kleine Schwestern.
Ich habe einen großen/kleinen Bruder Ich habe 2 große/kleine Brüder.

Let’s practice!

 

Kleiner Hinweis

German is different than English in that it has something called grammatical gender. All nouns in German are classified grammatically as masculine, neuter, or feminine. When a noun refers to people, the grammatical gender usually matches the biological sex and is indicated by a form of the definite article: “der” (masculine), “das” (neuter), or “die” (feminine), all meaning “the”.
MASCULINE der Mann FEMININE die Frau
der Bruder die Schwester
However, when we refer to things or concepts, the grammatical gender obviously has nothing to do with the biological sex.
MASCULINE der Name FEMININE die Familie
der Hund die Katze

 

Kleiner Hinweis

Not all families look the same and many nuclear families look very different from traditional representations. Not only that, not everyone has family they enjoy talking about. Since this course is about preparing you to have actual conversations with German speakers, practice only talking about the parts of your family you want to talk about.

Here are some additional family words you may need to accurately describe your family:

die Stiefmutter stepmother der Stiefvater stepfather
die Stiefschwester stepsister der Stiefbruder stepbrother
die Halbschwester half-sister der Halbbruder half-brother
die Zwillingsschwester twin sister der Zwillingsbruder twin brother
ein Einzelkind an only child adoptiert adopted

If you refer to your step- and half-siblings in English without the quantifiers (step-/half-), you can do the same in German!

Don’t see words you need to describe your family? Ask your instructor!

 

Jetzt bist du dran!

Consider your nuclear family, those family members that are closest to you or that you grew up with. Write out a sentence that begins with, Ich habe…
Then record yourself saying which family members you have in your nuclear family. If you can do it immediately without reading, that’s great! Otherwise, practice saying it a couple times before recording. Or rerecord, if you are not satisfied.

3) Keine Familienmitglieder

But how would you say that you do not have a brother, sister, mother, or father? German uses a word in front of the noun to indicate that. To learn the word, answer the questions below (be sure to click through to the second question).

small family

 

 

Zum Schluß

In this lesson, you learned 1) say how big your family is, 2) list the members of your nuclear family, and 3) list which family members you do not have. If you are feeling unsure about any part of the expanded introduction, go back to that section and review.
Now write out how big your family is, which people belong to your nuclear family, and any pet(s) you have. Then record yourself in your audio journal. If you can do it immediately without reading, that’s great! Otherwise, practice saying it a couple times before recording. Or rerecord, if you are not satisfied.
In this lesson, you did not practice how to ask any questions to be able to learn about someone’s family. That’s by design. Instead, do you remember what the magic question is? That’s right! “Und du?“

**As you conclude this lesson, don’t forget to check Canvas!**

 

Before you go, check out these extra Familie resources.

Media Attributions

 

Media Attributions

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