Preparation for A2 German Exams

RogueCrab

Hi, I'm taking A2 German at the moment, but I really need to improve my grade in the summer exams.

I was just wondering what kind of books people usually used for their exams, espcially with oral exam preparation?

I've heard of Zeitgeist, Einsicht: Eine Neue Ausgabe and Schauplatz, but I was just wondering if anyone has found these to be helpful and if it's worth getting them or not?

For the speaking exam, I think the only thing you can do to help and improve your grade is to practise more and more, and make sure you're prepared at least 2 weeks before your exam - don't get cocky and think that you can just scrape x of a grade, which you'd be happy with, because you arent't marking yourself (not to sound like your parents or anything :p:

)

As for the issue of increasing your grades in general - you should learn little useful chunks of grammar from various grammar books, to help you in all components (especially in writing), you should buy a good vocabulary book (such as 'Advanced German Vocabulary') and you should use materials which should be available at school for reading and listening practise such as Authentik au Deutsch, as this considerably hones in your skills. :biggrin:

If you can't get hold of these, why not go browse the internet for some German radio stations, and download podcasts, or watch live German TV on Sky or over the Internet. :wink:

Hope that helped a little,

Gooner :smile:

Reply 2

hannah_dru

2

Go for Zeitgeist definitely.
I have Schauplatz but I haven't started using it yet. Even though it's for a different exam board from mine, it looks really useful.

Reply 3

gooner1592

As for the issue of increasing your grades in general - you should learn little useful chunks of grammar from various grammar books, to help you in all components (especially in writing), you should buy a good vocabulary book (such as 'Advanced German Vocabulary') and you should use materials which should be available at school for reading and listening practise such as Authentik au Deutsch, as this considerably hones in your skills. :biggrin:

If you can't get hold of these, why not go browse the internet for some German radio stations, and download podcasts, or watch live German TV on Sky or over the Internet. :wink:

Sounds like good advice. :smile:

You can also pick up quite a lot of vocabulary and phrases simply through reading German books, though, even if they don't seem directly relevant to your exams. If you're a bit masochistic, watching dvds with German subtitles and turning off the volume is a nice way of training yourself to take in German sentences fairly quickly. As for speaking, reading out texts can help to make you speak more fluently and get the intonation and pronunciation right - obviously it's important to know what to say, but examiners will be influenced by how you say it as well.

On a completely random note, gooner, that line in your sig is great. Never fails to make me squirm. :biggrin:

Reply 4

hobnob

Sounds like good advice. :smile:

You can also pick up quite a lot of vocabulary and phrases simply through reading German books, though, even if they don't seem directly relevant to your exams. If you're a bit masochistic, watching dvds with German subtitles and turning off the volume is a nice way of training yourself to take in German sentences fairly quickly. As for speaking, reading out texts can help to make you speak more fluently and get the intonation and pronunciation right - obviously it's important to know what to say, but examiners will be influenced by how you say it as well.

On a completely random note, gooner, that line in your sig is great. Never fails to make me squirm. :biggrin:

Which line? I have many lines in my signature :p:

I'm a siggy obsessive :redface:

Reply 5

The German one, of course. :wink:

Reply 6

hobnob

The German one, of course. :wink:

Ahh, the 'Mitgleid auf der....'one :p:

I know it's gramatically wrong, but after all, I did write it last july :p:

Therefore, my grammar wasn't very good at all - I had no idea about prepositions, and the cases :redface:

I'll change it now :wink:

Make sure you tell me if i'm still wrong with my corrections :smile:

Reply 7

Excalibur

15

gooner1592

Ahh, the 'Mitgleid auf der....'one :p:

I know it's gramatically wrong, but after all, I did write it last july :p:

Therefore, my grammar wasn't very good at all - I had no idea about prepositions, and the cases :redface:

I'll change it now :wink:

Make sure you tell me if i'm still wrong with my corrections :smile:

Is Gesellschaft even used in this context? I always thought it meant more 'society', as in sociology type, rather than society as in group. hobnob? :p:

Reply 8

Excalibur

Is Gesellschaft even used in this context? I always thought it meant more 'society', as in sociology type, rather than society as in group. hobnob? :p:

You know, I think you're right :p:

My dictionary says that society in terms of being in a club/association would be 'der Verein' but referring to a group of people who share interests, aims and beliefs etc, it would be 'die Gemeinschaft'. Any ideas which I would use out of those two? :confused:

I would have guessed they were the same, really :s-smilie:

Reply 9

gooner1592

Ahh, the 'Mitgleid auf der....'one :p:

I know it's gramatically wrong, but after all, I did write it last july :p:

Therefore, my grammar wasn't very good at all - I had no idea about prepositions, and the cases :redface:

I'll change it now :wink:

Make sure you tell me if i'm still wrong with my corrections :smile:

Close, but not quite. :wink:

'Mitglied der deutschen Gesellschaft'.

Reply 10

Excalibur

Is Gesellschaft even used in this context? I always thought it meant more 'society', as in sociology type, rather than society as in group. hobnob? :p:

No, it can mean 'society' as in 'group' as well. 'Verein' is more like a sports club, and 'Gemeinschaft' means 'society' as in 'company'. I'd use neither of them for a language society.

Reply 11

hobnob

Close, but not quite. :wink:

'Mitglied der deutschen Gesellschaft'.

Oh, right, thanks for that :biggrin:

Reply 12

No problem. The first version was funnier, though. :p:

Reply 13

Excalibur

15

hobnob

No, it can mean 'society' as in 'group' as well. 'Verein' is more like a sports club, and 'Gemeinschaft' means 'society' as in 'company'. I'd use neither of them for a language society.

Oh, OK. Maybe we should just stick with "The German Society". :p:

Reply 14

Excalibur

Oh, OK. Maybe we should just stick with "The German Society". :p:

Fair enough. :biggrin:

Although it might be fun to rename it to 'Dem Deutsches Gesellschaft' and make everyone a member who posts to complain about the name being grammatically wrong...

Reply 15

RogueCrab

OP

gooner, hannah_dru and hobnob,

cheers to you all! :smile:

(and rep too, if I could, but I still haven't quite got used to forums yet)

You've all got some brilliant ideas, which I'll be trying soon. We've got Authentik in the library at school I think, so I'll be hunting that down and the german dvd with subtitles on sounds like a great idea. My teacher told me to get "the pledge", has anyone seen it? It looks a bit...weird! :s-smilie:

Reply 16

The Pledge? Would that be a film version of Dürrenmatt's Das Versprechen by any chance? Well, if that's the case and if it's anything like the book, it ought to be good. :smile:

Reply 17

RogueCrab

OP

hobnob

The Pledge? Would that be a film version of Dürrenmatt's Das Versprechen by any chance? Well, if that's the case and if it's anything like the book, it ought to be good. :smile:

Ooo yes yes it is! :smile:

She's given me the book, in case I wanted to do coursework on it but it seems quite long. All I know is that its about a promise to find a child's murderer apparently and that the film has jack nicholson in :rolleyes:

Reply 18