Start of the German language Journey

AHA moment - after spending 4 years in Germany once I realized I am going to stay here for a long time at, end of 2019 I really felt the need to urgently learn German.

Dec'19 Started with VHS A1.1 course with 2 other colleagues.

March'20 Stopped due to COVID

Started again in May'20, finished A1.1 without much confidence

Started A1.2 in Sept with one colleague who dropped out later. I continued.

Sense of urgency in Oct - I should get my A1 certificate in Dec in order to get my Perm residency in Germany

A1 exam prep - serious prep for A1 starts (regular classes in VHS A1.2 and 1 session with Julia)

  • A little bit of practice in the class but not as much helpful, however, the classes were pretty cheap
  • Some help from Julia, however practicing on Duolingo and also the German A1 prufung book helped a lot
  • Downloaded some practice exams (3) online and did practice the ones in the A1 prufung book
  • Tips from online Youtube video and also from Julia on various sections, the format of the exam and what to expect and how to respond
  • Some myths of asking for another word, using dictionary all were clarified
  • Exam day - well prepared and excited, managed to write the exam very well, speaking part was really difficult as I needed to practice speaking even more especially when you have others watching you. It was the confidence, clarity of speech, and general structure of the sentence formation that teachers grade on.
  • The results will be out before 17th Dec - my expectation 90%
Overall confidence level has gone up significantly due to the prep for the exam and hoping to keep up the momentum with Julia and group lessons.

Plan (12-15 months):

  • A2.1 - Dec/Jan (with an instructor- 2x week)
  • A2.2 - Feb/Mar (with an instructor-- 2x week)
  • B1.1 - Apr/May/Jun (with an instructor-- 1x week + intense class)
  • B1.2 - Jul/Aug/Sep (with an instructor-- 1x week + intense class)
  • B2.1 - Oct/Nov/Dec (with an instructor-- 1x week + intense class)
  • B2.2 - Jan/Feb/Mar (with an instructor-- 1x week + intense class)
  • potentially add (C1 when B1 is achieved)

Investment (I like to think of it that way):

A1:800 --> success or not update after the exam results come out

A2: 1000

B1: 1400

B2: 1400

Books + Duolingo app + stationary etc = 300

Exam fees = 700

Total = 5600

See you soon!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A1 done off to A2

  26-Mar - A2 Getting ready for the A2 exam next week. A1 was intimidating and pushed me to put a lot of extra effort.. fortunately I didn't have my job obligation while preparing for the exam as I was off after surgery so used my time for studying... Did end up using a lot of extra help from a private teacher (costing me 400 euros or so) but she covered both A1.1 and A1.2. I used a Duolingo subscription and also lots of model tests (Free) from Goethe.. End results - passed with 95% and a sehr gut remark! Started with A2.1 in Feb and A2.2 in March... quite a lot of new topics and lots of grammar but exciting too.. learning lots of new things and the reasons why Deutsch language is constructed a certain way.. it will be a difficult but exciting journey... I am already using every opportunity these days to speak German, be it in my class, in the market, with the doctor's appointment and what not.. but trust me it's not easy... my younger daughter helps me with the practice (7...
Read more