Day One German | Beginner News-Focused German Course
Day One German is a 20-episode beginner podcast for absolute German learners who want to understand slow German news. No prior German is needed. In five minutes a day, you learn essential German words, verbs, phrases, grammar patterns, and listening skills. The podcast prepares you to listen to the main LinguaWire A1 German news feed, which posts daily episodes discussing real news stories in simple A1 German. LinguaWire podcasts use AI support with translations and multi-language recording under native speaker supervision.
Episodes
Day 20: Graduation — your first German news bulletin
Get the complete Day One German master sheet at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Graduation day. In the final episode, Felix and Leonie guide you through your first full German news bulletin, built from the vocabulary and grammar of the previous nineteen lessons: elections, weather, strikes, sport, business, headlines, past tense, and future tense. The bulletin is read like real radio, but slowly enough
Day 19: How to read German headlines
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.German headlines don’t always behave like full German sentences. Today Felix and Leonie teach “telegram German”: the stripped-down style of headlines, where articles disappear and verbs are often missing. You’ll learn how to expand short headlines back into normal sentences using grammar you already know. The diplomacy vocabulary als
Day 18: The German future with wird — and the will trap
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today you move from the past to the future. Felix and Leonie teach the German future pattern: werden plus a verb at the end. You’ll also learn an important trap: German will usually means “wants,” not “will.” The episode uses business-news vocabulary: company, factory, jobs, build, and create. Today’s sentence is: Die Firma wird eine
Day 17: The sentence bracket — past tense, part two
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today is a milestone: your first two-sentence German news story. Felix and Leonie use an earthquake report to show how the German past tense works in real sentences — and how the “sentence bracket” opens near the start and closes at the end. You’ll also dismantle Erdbeben as a compound word. Today’s story is: Ein Erdbeben hat die Reg
Day 16: The German past tense — the ge- hug
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Final week begins with the past tense, because news is full of things that already happened. Today you don’t need to master every past-tense form — you just need to recognise the shape: haben plus a past participle, often wearing the little ge- hug. Felix and Leonie also introduce war and peace vocabulary. Today’s sentence is: Der Pr
Day 15: German question words — wer, was, wo, wann, warum
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.News exists to answer questions, so today you get the German question kit: wer, was, wo, wann, warum, and wie. Felix and Leonie focus on the common English-speaker trap: wer means “who,” while wo means “where.” You’ll also meet wollen — to want — a key verb in politics and interviews. Today’s sentence is: Wer ist die neue Ministerin,
Day 14: Kein vs nicht — the two German no's
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.German has two everyday ways to say “not”: kein and nicht. Today Felix and Leonie make the difference simple: use kein with nouns and nicht with almost everything else. You’ll practise this through a very news-like sentence about electricity, schools, and disruption in the north. Today’s sentence is: Im Norden gibt es keinen Strom, u
Day 13: Days, months and seasons in German
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Every news story happens at a time: Monday, Friday, this week, next month, in winter, in summer. Today Felix and Leonie teach the German days of the week, months, seasons, and the verbs beginnen and enden. You’ll also meet the odd one out among the weekdays: Mittwoch. Today’s sentence is: Der Gipfel beginnt am Montag und endet am Fre
Day 12: Kommen, gehen, fahren — and nach for countries
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today is movement day: people come, go, travel, arrive, and leave — exactly the kind of language that appears in festival, migration, travel, and border stories. You’ll learn kommen, gehen, and fahren, plus country names and nationalities. Felix and Leonie also explain the useful German travel word nach. Today’s sentence is: Tausende
Day 11: Sagen and your first German comparison
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Week three begins with the verb that powers half of journalism: sagen — to say. You’ll learn how German news introduces quotes, how to understand a colon in a headline-style sentence, and how to talk about basic food words like bread, milk, water, and coffee. Felix and Leonie also introduce your first comparison: more expensive. Toda
Day 10: Football German — spielen, das Tor, gewinnen
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.You’re halfway through Day One German. Today is sport day, with the words you need for football and match reports: team, fans, goal, to play, to win, and to lose. Felix and Leonie also show how much English hides inside German sports language, from Fans to Team to Trainer. Today’s sentence is: Die Nationalmannschaft spielt heute Aben
Day 9: Money in German — and the unbending Euro
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today’s topic is the cost of living: prices, money, high, low, more, less, expensive, cheap, and the verb kosten. Felix and Leonie explain how German talks about money in simple news sentences, including one useful quirk: Euro usually stays unchanged in the plural. Today’s sentence is: Die Preise sind hoch, und die Menschen haben wen
Day 8: Welded words — Flughafen, Hauptbahnhof
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today you learn transport German: trains, stations, airports, open, closed, full, and delayed. Felix and Leonie also introduce one of the most famous features of German: compound words. Long German words often aren’t new words at all — they’re familiar words welded together. You’ll learn how Flughafen and Hauptbahnhof work. Today’s s
Day 7: Es gibt — how German says "there is"
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today is weather day — a perfect beginner news topic. You’ll learn hot, cold, rain, degrees, north, south, east, and west. The grammar star is es gibt, the German phrase for “there is” or “there are,” which literally means “it gives.” Felix and Leonie make it feel natural through a weather-news sentence. Today’s sentence is: Es ist v
Day 6: Election German — die Wahl, wählen, der Wähler
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Week two begins with the language of politics and elections. You’ll learn how one German root can unlock a whole word family: die Wahl is the election, wählen is to vote, and der Wähler is the voter. Felix and Leonie also introduce polls, closeness, and the useful phrase am Sonntag. Today’s sentence is: Die Wahl ist am Sonntag, und d
Day 5: German plurals and the umlaut
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today closes week one with professions, strikes, and German plurals. You’ll learn words like doctors and teachers, see how German makes nouns plural in several different ways, and meet the umlaut as a small mark with a big sound. You’ll also practise your first full regular verb: streiken — to strike. Today’s sentence is: Die Ärzte u
Day 4: Big German numbers are Lego
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.News loves numbers, and German numbers are built like Lego. In this episode, you’ll learn hundert, tausend, zehntausend, and the crowd vocabulary that appears in protest and demonstration stories. Felix and Leonie break down how large German numbers stick together into long but logical words. Today’s sentence is: Mehr als zehntausend
Day 3: Der, die, das — never learn a naked noun
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today is the famous German article day: der, die, das. Instead of trying to make German gender “make sense,” you’ll learn the LinguaWire rule: never learn a naked noun. Felix and Leonie introduce government, police, army, streets, and heute — today — while completing your first real sein patterns. Today’s sentence is: Die Regierung,
Day 2: The verb haben — and why nouns wear capitals
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Today you learn your second essential German verb: haben — to have. Felix and Leonie show how haben helps you talk about family, children, and basic facts in the news. You’ll also spot one of German’s most visible quirks: every noun starts with a capital letter. Today’s sentence is: Die Kanzlerin hat zwei Kinder und wohnt in der Haup
Day 1: The verb sein and the German number trick
Get the learning sheet and homework at www.linguawire.com/dayone.Day One German begins with the most important verb in the language: sein — to be. You’ll learn how to say “I am,” “he is,” and “she is,” meet your first German news word, der Präsident, and discover the satisfyingly logical way German builds numbers. By the end of the episode, you’ll understand and say a real German-style news senten
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