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| 1. Explanation of future tenses 2. How to conjugate werden 3. A list of some Zeitangaben and how to formulate your own 4. How to make sentences with werden & Zeitangaben |
Making sentences using the future tense is the only way we make expressions of things we expect to happen and long for. By “future” one doesn’t necessarily mean in “unforeseen” years to come as the future could mean the next moment, day, week, month, year and even a couple more years to come etc. This is of course not a guarantee that those expectations would be met but it certainly sets the focus clear.
The future tense in German can be expressed in two ways;
- The use of future tense auxiliary “werden”
- The use of “Zeitangaben”
How to use use werden with future tense
When using the future tense auxiliary “werden”, it is conjugated in the present tense to the subject in the second position while the supported verb is placed at the end of the sentence in its finite form. To learn the conjugation of werden see here. Examples on how to use the future tense auxiliary “werden” are shown below.
| Usage |
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| 1. Meine Familie wird den nächsten Urlaub in Frankreich machen.—— My family will spend the next holiday in France. 2. Wo wirst du deinen Geburtstag feiern?—— Where will you celebrate your birthday? 3. Ihr werdet das Haus aufräumen.—— You (guys) will clean up the house. |
How to make future sentences with Zeitangaben
Zeitangabe on the other hand are temporal adverbs which are formed from seasons and time related nouns by combining with prepositions such as “in” or “an” and certain adjectives such as “nächst-” and “letzt-” or by simply add “-s” to such nouns to indicate continuity or repetition. They can either be used with reference to the past or future. Because they are adverbs, they are placed either at the preverbal position ( at the beginning of the sentence) or directly after the verb. Except the direct or indirect object is a pronoun then it is placed after the objects. Read more on adverbs here. Some examples of temporal Adverbs or Zeitangabe are listed below;
| German | English |
|---|---|
| am + time of day (e.g Abend) am + Tag in + der Nacht am + day of week (e.g Freitag) am Wochenende nächste*n Woche nächste*n + month (e.g April) nächste*n Monat nächstes Jahr letzte Woche letzte*r*n + month e.g (April) letzte*r*n Monat letztes Jahr im + Season (e.g Winter) im + month (e.g April) im Dezember days + s (e.g montags) month + s (e.g Aprils) Time of day + s (e.g abends) Jahren (e.g 2016) | in the evening in the day in the night on Friday in the weekend next week next April next month next year last week last April last month last year in winter in April in December (every)Monday*s every April (every)evening*s in years (e.g in 2016) |
**Note:
- The adjective changes ending based on grammatical case.
- The years in German don’t use the preposition “in” like English.
| Usage |
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| 1. Im Sommer machen wir einen Fest.—— we are having a festival in summer. 2. Ich war letzter Monat in Hamburg.—— I was in Hamburg last month. 3. Sollen wir am Wochenende einen Ausflug machen?—— should we go outing in the weekend? 4. Sie ist 1998 geboren.—— she was born in 1998. |