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Teaching the definite article of each and every German noun (and for
those of us non-native speakers, learning those definite articles ourselves) may at times seem like an uphill battle, a struggle not even worth
mounting. But like it or not, gender is an essential part of the German language. As we well know, the entire case systemwith all of the definite
articles, indefinite articles, der-words, ein-words, personal pronouns,
possessive pronouns, relative clauses, and adjective endingshinges on
whether a given noun is accompanied by der, die, or das. Start on
a false basis, and the whole structure crumbles.
For many nouns, repeated encounters with the words in context and
targeted practice are the only ways our students will eventually match
each noun to its proper gender. But for a surprisingly large set of nouns,
there are guidelines that can point the way to a correct gender determination. In my language classes, I provide my students with many opportunities to learn the definite articles of nouns in a natural way, through large
volumes of free readingthirty minutes per calendar day in my intermediate fourth-semester classand I encourage them to learn the gender of
each noun in their online flashcard work. But I also take them through a
carefully constructed set of activities designed to teach them the guidelines that do exist for determining noun gender. These guidelines can be
learned explicitly and applied immediately, giving the students a quick
boost in accuracy and new-found confidence with the German case system.
I often start the process of introducing my students to what I refer to as
the Gender Rules and Tips with a brief discovery-learning lesson. I remind the students of the rules and tips they already know (even if it is only
the fact that nouns referring to men take der and nouns referring to
women take die) and explain that there are many other such regularities in the language that they probably have not yet noticed. I tell them
that together, the class will work out what some of these other regularities
are. Each student is given a data bank, and pairs of students work together to make a series of hypotheses about the rules and tips governing
gender assignment. The data bank consists of a simple table of nouns
with their definite articles: der Professor, das Hndchen, die
Lampe.
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Data Bank
Hypotheses
The Data Bank is a word list engineered to enable students to infer the
rules and tips, with multiple instances of each so that students can confirm their hypotheses while navigating around a few carefully chosen exceptions to the rules. After about ten minutes of pair work, I call the group
back together. As students offer their hypotheses and we fill in a master
chart together, I am able to correct, clarify, or expand on what they say
and to call attention to the evidence that supports each hypothesis and
any exceptions. This initial activity allows students to discover some of
the patterns on their own, involving them in the process and beginning to
make the guidelines memorable.
Make a table of your hypotheses. Write down your guess at the rules
or tips under the corresponding definite articles.
der
die
das
der Wein
das Bier
das Radio
die Decke
das Kind
die bung
der Vater
der Professor
das Lamm
das Schwimmen
der Onkel
die Republik
das Trinken
der Wagen
der
Kommunismus
das Auto
die Musik
das Essen
der
Rassismus
der Garten
der Whisky
die Lampe
das Baby
die
Wohnung
das Gepck
das Gesicht
das Auge
Next I provide students with a more comprehensive list of the Gender Rules and Tips. Although this list always goes beyond the limited
scope of the discovery lesson data set, I am careful not to overburden
them with a lengthy list unless they are at the most advanced levels. In beginning classes I stick with a simple list that includes basics such as names
of the days, months, and seasons (der) and nouns ending in heit and
schaft (die). In intermediate classes I expand to a list that includes more
obscure vocabulary and more complexities, such as names of most young
animals (das) and most nouns ending in al, ar, ier, and on, if they do
not refer to people (das). Not until our Senior Seminar course do I give
them a comprehensive list of rules and tips that I have gathered from various
sources, which includes some amusing ones such as Names of most rivers
outside Germany except for those ending in a, or e, which are feminine
(der). In each list, I include example words that the students are likely to be
familiar with to illustrate each of the categories: der Herbst, die
Freiheit, das Kalb, das Signal, der Mississippi. I treat the list as a reference sheet, printing it on colored paper and three-hole punching it so
that they can keep it in the front of their binders and refer to it often.
The final step, obviously, is to get students to actually learn the rules
and tips and to practice using them. I have converted each of the lists into
a set of flashcards that are posted on the website of the online flashcard
program Anki. Students simply add the flashcards to their Anki decks
and practice until they know the information by heart. On each card,
they are asked a question: What is the definite article for words ending
with keit? and they mentally provide an answer: die. Then they click
a button to check their answer and another to rate themselves. Did they
find the question hard? easy? very easy? The program uses the rating information to assign the next repetition of the cardsoon, if the student
did not know the answer at all, or later, if the student was able to answer
very easily. Additional decks of cards quiz example words: What is the
definite article of the word Universitt? The spaced repetition algorithm
on which the program is based assures an efficient use of students study
time and durability of the knowledge through continual review.1
I use class time to reinforce what the students have learned on their
own. Each day for a week or so, we spend five minutes on a fast-paced
practice session that makes sure the students are making the rules and
tips automatic not only in response to the written prompts that Anki provides, but also to oral ones I provide in class. The practice session uses a
two-stage scaffolded approach that allows all students to participate and
calls for maximum accountability.
In the first stage of the practice session, students respond to cues with
one of three cards (der, die, and das), which they have picked up
as they entered the room. The cards are simply 3 x 5 index cards with a
1 Praising the Anki program and similar systems (SuperMemo, Mnemosyne, Memrise) is
beyond the scope of this article, but I urge anyone interested in bettering students basic
knowledge of historical dates, past participles, vocabulary items, or any other facts to look
into the idea of spaced repetition upon which these programs are based. Except for
SuperMemo, these programs are free. The decks I have created for the Gender Rules and
Tips are available on Ankis Shared Decks page, at http://ankisrs.net/. Download the
program, then click the Get Shared button to search for the decks.
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piece of colored paper with der (red), die (blue), or das (green)
glued to the card, front and back, laminated for durability. I say a noun,
and the students simply show the card they believe is correct, simultaneously. With this method, there is safety in numbers and the anonymity
of silence. The affective filter stays low, because if students need a hint,
they can glance from side to side to see what their neighbors think. After
students have had a second to think and respond, I give the correct answer orally and hold up the correct card to reinforce the answer with a visual confirmation. Because the cards are color-coded, I can see at a
glance approximately how many students know the correct answer and
which students are having difficulty. Because the cards are two-sided, the
students can see their answers as they hear and see the correct answer, reinforcing correct answers and identifying incorrect ones. The pace is
quick and energizing, and everyone is engaged, because everyone must
answer every time.
In the second stage of the practice session, students take more individual responsibility for correct answers. I have the students put the cards
away, and we move to oral, individual response. I do not take volunteers,
but rather call on students, using the cold call technique. I say the word,
pause for about one second, then say a students name: Demokratie[pause]Katherine. Stating the question first before calling on a
particular student to answer ensures that all students are involved at all
times, because they never know when they might be called on. Each
time, they need to listen carefully to the question and formulate an answer. I move quickly from question to question and from person to person, stopping only if the original answer given is incorrect to give a quick
Nein and switch to another student. Occasionally I follow up by having
a student state the relevant rule or tip (answering the simple question
Warum?) or by having the class as a whole repeat the correct article
and noun to solidify the sound of the pair in their ears and the feel of it in
their mouths: die Demokratie!
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Beyond these quick targeted practice sessions that I conduct while the
students are in the initial stages of learning the rules and tips, I use some
class time throughout the semester to give students more contextualized
practice using the gender rules and tips in an activity I call, simply,
Tafelarbeit. All students work at the board simultaneously; I call out a
sentence in English and each student writes an equivalent German sentence on the board. While the class is writing, I can easily assess each students ability and I can coach them through any tricky spots, reminding
them what tools they can use to write accurate sentences. When it comes
to the definite articles, I feed the students reminders about the rules and
tips: Some of you dont have the correct definite article for Sommer.
What do the Rules and Tips tell us about times of year? Rightall of the
seasons are der-words. Remember that the same is true for the days of the
week and the months of the year. Many of you are having trouble with
the gender of Republik. What words does Republik rhyme with? How
about Musik? or Fabrik? Ahaso its a die-word, just like the other
words that end in ik. Are we talking about one car or two? Right, two.
So youre right that its der Wagen because it ends in en and its not an
infinitive. But in this case we need to write die Wagen because its plural. Before long, the students have the rules and tips memorized and can
use them when composing sentences. What they then know by heart and
can produce accurately in a controlled setting serves as an excellent basis
for more synthetic, creative, and authentic language work.
Assessment of students ability to use the gender rules and tips is natural and ongoing in the activities described above. In addition to this informal assessment, I include items on summative quizzes and tests that are
specifically designed to test students ability to apply their knowledge of
noun gender in a formal context, where getting the right answers makes a
difference in their grades. Sometimes I ask for the definite articles in a
completely uncontextualized format: ____ Mittwoch, ____ Realitt,
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____ Lamm. At other times, I combine the testing of noun gender with
that of other grammar points, for example, with accusative and dative
prepositions: von ____ Baby, mit ____ Wagen, fr ____
Universitt. And of course when students do writing on formal assessments where grammatical accuracy is one of the grading criteria, their
application of the gender rules and tips plays a role in the grade they earn.
In conclusion, I believe that learning the rules and tips that govern the
gender assignment of certain sets of German nouns is an efficient way to
boost accuracy quickly. It is really not very difficult for students to learn
the fifteen rules of thumb listed on my Level I Gender Rules and Tips list.
By memorizing just fifteen pieces of information, they can instantly identify the genders of hundreds of the nouns that are common at a beginning
level: der Onkel, der Verkufer, der Franzose, der Schler, der Koffer, der
Professor, der Kuchen, der Computer, der Freitag, der Frhling, der
Wein, die Lehrerin, die Amerikanerin, die Schwester, die bung, die
Freundschaft, die Freiheit, die Musik, die Religion, die Universitt, die
Metzgerei, die Biologie, die Lampe, das Essen, das Gemse, das
Mdchen, das Auto, das Museum, das Baby, and many more.
At the same time that students are gaining in accuracy, they are also
gaining confidence in their ability to understand the way the German
language works. Especially at the beginning stages of language learning,
dealing with what seems like an arbitrary system can be frustrating for
students. In my experience, just this little handle on a corner of the German language can make students feel more at ease with the rather baroque case system that seems to loom over everything they try to do with
the language. If they know they can count on these patterns to give them
clues about the gender assignment of a fairly large number of common
words, then the article-noun pairs that need to be learned by rote seem
less harassing and the whole language-learning process more manageable.
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Nouns from foreign words ending in ei, ie, ik, ion, and tt
die Bckerei, die Energie, die Musik, die Religion,
die Universitt
Masculine (der)
Feminine (die)
Neuter (das)
Nouns referring to female persons, their professions, and their Most nouns ending in o and um
nationalities
das Auto, das Studium
die Mutter, die Lehrerin, die Amerikanerin
Names of most young people
das Baby, das Kind
Nouns ending in ung
die Wohnung, die bung
25% of the words not covered by the rules and tips
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Feminine (die)
Masculine (der)
Most nouns ending in -e (exceptions: those with prefix Geand those denoting males)
die Lampe, die Decke, die Kreide
Neuter (das)
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Most nouns ending in al, ar, ier, and on, if they do not refer to people
das Signal, das Formular, das Papier, das Stadion
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Feminine (die)
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Most nouns ending in al, ar, ier, and on, if they do not refer to people
das Signal, das Formular, das Papier, das Stadion
Names of colors
das Blau, das Purpur
Names of fractions
das Viertel, das Zehntel
Sources
Ashworth-Fiedler, S. (2003). Teach Yourself Quick Fix German Grammar. New York:
McGraw-Hill.
Dippmann, G., and Watzinger-Tharp, J. (1999). A Practical Review of German Grammar. 3rd
edition. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Durrell, M. (2003). Using German: A Guide to Contemporary Usage. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.