This post is an overview of how I taught myself German (for free!) & passed Goethe's A1 Exam.
I drove up to Chicago on Tuesday to take the A1 German Language Test at the Goethe Institute next to Millennium Park. Spoiler: yes, I did pass with an evaluation of "Sehr Gut!" and received an official certificate in German language ability.
I had to take this exam before I left for Austria. Why? AuPairs in Austria and Germany are required to prove their German language skills in order to be considered for a work visa, which I need since I'm staying longer than 3 months. The only language proof required is the most basic level, A1. You have to get a language certificate at an accredited institution such as the Goethe Institute (found all over the world and in main US cities like Chicago and NYC), TELC, and partners of each of these organizations (IU is one of them). If you don't get a certification at these places, it's possible that your host country won't approve your work visa application. This is the reason standardized tests are used so much, to ensure validity and credibility of results.
Unfortunately, I discovered in early July that IU was too short staffed this summer to proctor a Goethe exam for me. This forced me to go on a wild goose chase, trying to find and contact various Goethe locations and partners to schedule a test session.
The only place that responded positively was the Goethe Institute of Chicago. Everywhere else either did not offer the A1 exam or did not have a time slot available. Chicago offered me individual testing sessions on three different days when two staff could be available to take me through the exam - for double the regular price. Alas, it was my only viable option, so I accepted the offer for Tuesday, July 30, 2019, and said goodbye to an unexpected $260 (yikes).
I woke up at 4:30AM in order to get to my exam in Chicago at 9:00AM. I spent the entire drive listening to Radio Lingua’s German podcasts and getting nervous. This test was expensive, and it was the only place and time I could take it before I leave - what if I didn’t pass? What would I do then?
What it took to get there
For the past two-and-a-half months, I have been teaching myself German through various free, online resources. For about 75% of this time period, I studied for 3 or more hours a day. Time and motivation (as well as access to resources) are all you need to learn something new, trust me. You can do it!
In order to figure out the best way to get started and which resources to use, I looked up something along the lines of "How to learn German" on Google (seems pretty straightforward, right?) immediately after submitting my last final assignment at IU. I found several different websites with varying costs that were highly recommended by a couple different sites. I started with a no-questions-asked-rebate 60-day trial of GermanPod101.com, which gives you access to thousands of audio lessons with vocabulary, an Anki-like flash card system, word lists (top 100-1000), and PDFs of the lessons. That's a great place to start, because it is organized for beginners to safely wade through the hundreds of possible ways to start learning the German language. The flash card system made up of word decks from lessons and top word lists was key to me building my German vocabulary.
GermanPod101.com was not the only resource I used, because it failed to educate me on grammar, and I wanted to practice listening to native speakers (one of the hosts on their podcasts is not a native speaker and has poor pronunciation). I greatly improved my reading comprehension when I stumbled upon German.net. I completed all the reading sections (levels A1-B2) and felt much more confident in my reading ability thereafter.
My favorite resource was a podcast by Radio Lingua Network called Coffee Break German. In this podcast, Mark, a Scot, takes us through his journey of learning German with the help of native German speakers (Hallo Thomas und Julia!). I learned as he learned. What's great about this podcast is that everything is explained very well, Mark asks good questions as he learns that many listeners - including me! - also have, and it builds up from basic sentences needed to get around to advanced grammar. Plus, it doesn't hurt that there's lots of laughing and feeling silly for butchering difficult German words (Mark's favorite: Ausgezeichnet!).
The biggest confusion I had with the German language can be summarized into What Is Up With This Sentence Structure Send Help. The issue for me wasn't where the verb went, but where all the other words lined up. For example, the sentence "He will go to the park with his dog tomorrow" would be written as "Tomorrow go he with his dog to the park" based on sentence structure rules. However, "with his dog" and "to the park" can be switched around based on emphasis, according to some websites informally written by native speakers (see https://yourdailygerman.com/german-word-order/). This website helped me realize that for all the little pieces in the middle, it doesn't always matter what order you put them in, as long as the verb comes second and the other verbs come last (for basic sentences). It's much more complicated than this, but there are enough guidelines to help you get through it if you're considered making a stab at DEUTSCH.
Here are *some* of the other resources I used:
SECTION A: general learning
1. https://www.thegermanproject.com/german-lessons (great basic overview of grammatical concepts)
2. FluentU - This is just one of the pages I read online after typing in random questions about German in Google. Almost always, a link to FluentU would pop up and give me a detailed answer to my question. I never found a main page through which to scroll through lessons, I just found individual articles that would encourage me to buy a subscription (ha, no. If you haven't gathered by now, I tried to make the most out of what free resources I could find).
3. https://learngerman.dw.com/en/grammar (more grammar)
4. German for English Speakers - I loved this website. It helped me learn verb tenses and has a complete list of irregular verbs.
SECTION B: for the Goethe test
2. Word List - Fun fact, I didn't find this until the day before I took the test. Why? Because it's on a linked page three pages from the main A1 test page, under a list of regulatory and administrative information links. Maybe they made it difficult to find on purpose, since it was such a game-changing tool.
3. Practice Materials - For all four sections. Great resource.
PODCASTS (through the app):
1. Intermediate News in Slow German
2. SBS German - SBS Deutsch
3. Slow German mit Annik Rubens
4. Learn German by Podcast
5. My Daily Phrase German (another Radio Lingua podcast)
6. German Language Vocabulary by Dr. Brians
My experience taking the exam
I walked into the Crain Building and through a reception area surrounded by dust and construction. The Goethe Institute was located on the second floor. Bright green, blue, and red chairs spread around large white tables in spacious rooms with lots of windows.
I walked around. No one was there.
I saw a corner area labeled "offices" and found the woman I had been emailing back-and-forth about the exam.
"Hello, Jutta? It's Rose."
She swung around in her chair and smiled brightly. "Hallo Rose! Wie geht es Ihnen?"
"Mir geht es gut, danke."
"Ah, perfekt! Gute Arbeit."
Jutta continued to speak to me only in German. She explained the test process as she guided me to the exam room.
The Goethe A1 test in German takes about 90 minutes and consists of four sections: listening, reading, writing, and verbal. Overall, I found it just slightly more difficult than the practice exam on the Goethe Institute's website in terms of the first two sections, but the last two sections were much easier than anticipated. Jutta was very kind and personable. Though I was very nervous (since the test cost $$$ and it was my last chance to take it before I leave), her attitude helped prevent against what may have been a much more anxious experience for me.
After the test, Jutta came to me with a wide smile and said (in German): "Well done! You did super. Also, what classes did you take prior to this test?" I explained to her that I had taught myself using various websites and podcasts. She said she wanted to ask since most people who learned off the internet who took the A1 test here chose Babble, and they wouldn't pass. She wanted to emphasize to me how impressed she was that I had done as well as I had without a structured class.
Thank you, Jutta, for making such a crucial examination a pleasant experience!
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