In 1977, the German linguist Hans Glinz conducted a study in which he extracted the most common 25 verbs from a text corpus of 100 000 words (from: Granzow-Emden, M., Deutsche Grammatik verstehen und unterrichten, Tübingen, 2019.)
The list he came up with contained the following verbs:
Here the very basics of first encounters: How to introduce yourself, and, depending on the situation, first questions to get to know each other further. As in all cultures, what is okay to ask and what might be too personal varies. Asking where someone lives, when they came to Germany, where they work, what they like doing, or what kind of things they generally like will most likely be okay for all.
An important aspect to consider when learning a language is that every word has its own specific grammatical ‘behavior’. Instead of learning general rules of grammar, look at the grammatical behavior of lexical elements in context, and don’t spend too much time trying to memorize words individually outside a context of use. Learning word lists rarely results in being able to use them. It mainly results in passive knowledge of word recognition. Instead, look at how words ‘behave’ in contexts of use. How do they fit in structurally? With which other words do they most commonly co-occur?
When it comes to speaking and writing about the past, German and English are different from one another, so be careful when translating. Look at the little dialogue below.