German grammar for the onSET C-Test

50 lessons in 19 units: rules and examples covering German word types, cases, verbs and endings. Four complete lessons are free.

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1 Foundations

What grammar even is: word types, sentence parts, endings, and the German writing system. Everything later builds on this.

2 Gender & articles

Why every noun is der, die or das, how to guess the gender, and all article words (der/ein/kein/mein) at a glance.

3 The four cases

German's central system: how articles and endings mark a noun's role in the sentence.

4 Nouns: plural & declension

The five plural patterns, the dative -n, and the small group of nouns that take endings of their own (n-declension).

5 Pronouns

Personal pronouns in all cases, possessive articles (mein/sein/ihr), reflexive pronouns (sich), and the little all-purpose words man and es.

6 Verbs I: present tense

Regular conjugation, the vowel-changers (du fährst, er liest), the three irregulars (sein/haben/werden) and the modal verbs.

7 Verbs II: past tenses

The Perfekt (habe gemacht / ist gegangen), participle formation with ge-, and the Präteritum of the key verbs (war, hatte, konnte, wurde).

8 Separable verbs

an|rufen, auf|stehen, ein|kaufen: when the prefix moves to the end of the sentence and how the participle is built.

Prefix to the end: ich rufe dich anPreview · Pass

9 Prepositions & case

The third case trigger: fixed accusative and dative prepositions, the two-way prepositions (where? vs. where to?), and the contractions im/am/zur.

10 Adjective endings

Adjectives after der, ein and without an article: determine endings from case, gender and number, then practise in context.

11 Word order & connectors

The three connector classes and what they do to the verb: und/aber (nothing), weil/dass (verb to the end), deshalb/trotzdem (inversion).

12 For hard texts: passive, Konjunktiv, relative clauses

The structures of hard onSET texts: passive (wird gemacht), polite hypotheticals (würde, könnte, wäre), relative clauses and comparison.

13 Negation, imperative & questions

How to say no (nicht vs. kein), how to form commands and requests (imperative), and how to ask questions (W-questions and yes/no questions).

14 Verbs with prepositions

Learning fixed verb-preposition pairs with their case as one chunk (warten auf + acc) and the da-/wo-words (darauf, worauf) that replace and question them.

15 Infinitive clauses with zu

How to attach a second verb idea with no subject of its own: “…, zu + infinitive” and the purpose constructions um … zu, ohne … zu, statt … zu.

16 Future & time expressions

How German expresses the future (usually just present tense + a time word), the Futur I with werden, and time expressions: am Montag, im Mai, seit drei Jahren, vor einer Woche.

17 Word formation

How German builds new words: long compounds (das Hausaufgabenheft) and derivations with suffixes and prefixes (-ung, -er, -heit, -los, un-). The key to cracking half-deleted words in the C-test.

18 Small words & two-part connectors

Two-part conjunctions (nicht nur … sondern auch), indefinite pronouns (jemand, nichts, irgend-), the time triads (vor/vorher/bevor), and the means-word indem.

19 Fine points: participles, wo/was, hätte/wäre

Participles as adjectives (steigende Preise), wo and was as relative pronouns, and the past of Konjunktiv II plus the Plusquamperfekt.