Language Hacking German: Learn How to Speak German - Right Away (Language Hacking with Benny Lewis) Bilingual Edition

I love Benny, but initially I was only going to purchase this one book from his new series, since I already have some experience with French, Italian, and Spanish. Now that it's in my hands, I'm so glad that I ordered all four!I've had textbooks. I've used workbooks. There are apps, podcasts, and many other ways to learn languages. But Benny takes you through all of the initial steps with ease in a way that you'd be hard-pressed to find elsewhere, which is why he put these books together - he's familiar with the existing resources, and this is something NEW. Benny focuses on shortcuts that he calls "hacks" to aid in understanding grammar and memorizing words. It's built around conversations, but not in the hokey tourist-focused way most schoolroom courses plod through dialogues. You engage with the conversations much more dynamically, figuring out how to communicate things about yourself and specifics to listen for. Benny also assembles "conversational connectors" so that you can start to sound more natural in your speech. There is online audio to augment the book as well.While the course is built around working up to your first conversation, this book isn't strictly limited to beginners. It's quite helpful for review or filling in gaps in your knowledge. The layout is appealing and the book is thick, which makes it well-balanced: this is a course you'll want to stick with, because it's encouraging, meaty, and totally doable. The exercises are far more engaging than what I've seen in most workbooks; they help you focus your attention and get the most that you can out of each lesson. Above all, this book feels personal. It's a companion on your journey, a kickstart, a reference book and motivational sidekick all rolled into one. You'll be writing all over it, of course, so if you're learning in tandem you should each have your own copy. But that's what's brilliant about this: it's more durable and meaningful than the average workbook that you wouldn't really need after you've finished it, and it will be invaluable throughout your learning process. I haven't started learning German yet, but this is all I'll need for the first few weeks when I start. And from there, I'll be conversant and comfortable with forging ahead on my own.

I had to prepare for a permanent move to Germany and spoke zero German. I discovered quickly that the one problem that any language learner today will never face is a lack of material. In addition to traditional classes and textbooks, there are online courses, YouTube videos, podcasts, software, apps, and the list goes on. But this information overload leads to a lot of frustration, false starts, and a general sense of feeling overwhelmed. I was already a fan of Benny Lewis’s blog, and was very excited to find out about his new series. I have used many German language resources, and I will say that “Language Hacking German”, if not the most complete, is the one that you will learn the most from. This book will not make you an expert German speaker, but you will get a great foundation in the language. I can’t recommend it highly enough, and I look forward to trying others in the series.Here’s what I like about the book, and some thoughts which I hope that Benny and his publisher might take into account for future revisions.Pros:• A focus on speaking: Benny’s “speak from day one” approach is encouraging and a great motivator for learning, as you get to apply directly what you study.• Highly adaptable: if you like to use flashcards, apps or software, other books, etc., you can follow Benny’s program and still fit your other resources into it.• A proper place for grammar: Benny takes neither the “no grammar involved” approach nor the “must learn all the rules” method. You get just as much grammar as you need to learn your lesson, and still get enough grounding to expand your studies if you wish.• Realistic conversations: you won’t know how to say “the elephant drinks milk” after working through this book. You will be able to talk about your family and your interests, go shopping, travel, and order a meal.• Audio component: no language course is complete if you don’t have a way to hear and imitate proper pronunciation. This is provided online, because who uses CD’s anymore?Cons:• Workspace: the editors of future editions need to make a more realistic estimate of how much writing space the student needs in working through an exercise. Some of it gets a bit cramped.• Appendices: A reference section with important grammar rules and charts would be awesome, and would keep readers from wasting time flipping through pages trying to find the source. A section of blank pages to create our own vocabulary lists and cheat sheets would be invaluable.• Marginal notes: there’s a lot of great, if not essential, material that gets overlooked in the margins – it might be worth incorporating more of these notes into the main text.• Bad app: I don’t know if other users have had the same problem with the Teach Yourself app that I did, but for me it was cumbersome, slow, and crashed often. If the app can be improved, great, but I’d prefer to download a zip file that I can bring up on any device, online or off. Or even better, have a dedicated Language Hacking app.• Self-centered: though you do eventually move into other forms, the course begins with a lot of self-centered speech using “I”. Since my activities in Germany often involved my family, I really wanted to know the “we” forms, so I had to learn them outside of the course.None of these “Cons” is enough to reduce my overall rating. Vielen Dank, Benny.

So many of us learn a language in order to travel to a foreign country and find our way around. We don't want to appear to be that "ugly American" who arrogantly thinks everyone should understand English. We learn to say "hello"and "thank-you", "how much is the room?", and "where is this or that?" but something is still missing. We want to connect to someone and we can't because we really don't speak the language, we just have memorized the required phrases. Benny makes language learning personal. He starts in the first lesson, helping you to develop a working script about yourself that you can then use to ask others about themselves. The beauty of it all is that it works!This is not the only language learning book you will ever need but it is a great introduction to speaking "interactively". It is not something to use in the car, it requires some sit down study time and writing but most of all speaking, finding the vocabulary and verbs you will need to intoduce yourself and your world to others while being able to ask others about theirs. If you are traveling, you'll also need those survival phrases and a dictionary and perhaps a more conventional source to teach you the more formal forms of German. There is no index and the book is meant to be followed page by page, each lesson and "mission" building on the previous. But having studied Italian, Japanese and Greek with all kinds of apps, podcasts, and language books, I'm sorry I didn't have a book like this before. German will be easier because of Benny!