Hello, I am new on Memrise but I want to practice a few languages.
I’m not sure if I understand the concept. I clicked on courses and then on German. I saw a bunch of lessons that said beginner, intermediate, etc.
I went through one of them and it was ok. Now what?
I just keep clicking on random lessons or “courses” as they are called? Are there any structured courses that will help me get to fluency?
Thanks.
Well theres the Official courses (you mightve done these). But its really up to you.
What level do you think youre at? beginner? Amateur? Expert? GSCE AQA?
As far as I can tell, the official Memrise German courses are pretty well structured. German 1 is mostly noun acquisition and some adjectives and verbs for rounding, so it’s easier to learn how to build simple sentences in German 2 and 3. If you go through the lessons in order, especially if you use type-only, you should pick up quite a lot.
Still, I think Memrise is better used with a secondary, more in-depth course; it’s good for vocab but unless you’re the sort to pick up grammar via context and intuition, you’ll probably want a textbook (I most used German: An Essential Grammar and Intermediate German: A Grammar and Workbook, though I forget which was better — was pretty dry stuff). Your Daily German is a pretty useful reference blog on German grammar, too. (If you aren’t wanting overpriced paper textbooks specifically, I have a ridiculous number of German learning ebooks that I’m happy to share. Some of them have audio to go with.)
But try not to overlook the Memrise courses because of their informality. I did, once, until I realised that the way it teaches you is more organic than things like Duolingo, where I find it much harder to pick up new words. I do recommend the all-type script, though, for best retention. And make sure to do the review! Try to never let a course be entirely ‘complete’, as that’s a fast way to stop practising it often enough.
Rote wordlist wise, the most comprehensive German sidecourse is probably 5000 words (top 87%) sorted by frequency. Boring but invaluable.
Sorry, this is all a bit over the place. Probably not helpful at all — I blame my migraine.
Welcome to the club, Jas One Gower!
In addition to the other answers:
The easiest way to understand Memrise is to see it as a automated flash card program.
Each course contains a long list of word or phrase, e.g.
French - English
je - I
Je suis. - I am
Je suis Jas. - I am Jas.
For easiness, a course is usually divided in “level”.
Users can make their own course, and Memrise makes also courses themselves.
For whatever reason, Memrise does not offer their courses as one course for one language, but as 7 courses for each language. I guess, that’s because they want to keep it ‘short and simple’. They 7 courses teach up to early intermediate vocabulary.
Memrise will only help learning part of the language: the memorization part of vocabulary and phrases. With the phrases, also some grammar is thought, but not extensively IMHO.
For speaking, you need something else.
For listening, Memrise allows to upload audio and can test with prompting the audio or the user selecting the right audio. But this does not yet teach the understanding, comprehension of a full text.
For reading, Memrise does not offer full texts. You need to get them somewhere else.
For writing/composing: Memrise does not offer anything, (except spelling when memorizing the words)
So basically: Memrise is best for vocab.
I have used Memrise to assist myself in learning to languages - just the vocab list of my course books. It was a life saver for me in memorization. It created a basis for the real learning in using the language, not every time having forgotten the right word.
Good luck! Hope it helps you as much as it did me and many others.