Learn German A1 – Lesson 12: Seasons and weather

This is lesson 12 of the A1 German series on the OK+ channel, and its subject is Seasons and weather. It is built for someone starting from nothing who wants to use what they learn the same day, rather than collect rules that help neither in the street nor at the office.

The grammar it works on is Modalverb wollen · Ordinalzahlen. This page carries the rule explained, the fifteen words of the lesson, example sentences and an exercise for today.

Modalverb wollen · Ordinalzahlen

wollen expresses a plain will of one's own and behaves like the other modals: conjugated in second position, with the main verb bare at the end. Its singular is irregular in shape — ich will, du willst, er will — and then regular in the plural: wir wollen, ihr wollt, sie wollen.
Ordinal numbers add -te up to nineteen and -ste from twenty on, with two irregulars to learn: der erste and der dritte. In dates they are written with a full stop after the figure: am 1. Mai, read as am ersten Mai.

Ordinal numbers in dates

The fifteen words of this lesson

Example sentences

• Im Sommer will ich ans Meer fahren. — In summer I want to travel to the sea.
• Heute ist der erste Januar. — Today is the first of January.
• Im Winter schneit es oft. — In winter it often snows.
• Die Sonne scheint. — The sun is shining.
• Wir wollen im Frühling umziehen. — We want to move house in spring.

Today's exercise

Write four sentences, one per season, describing the weather and what you want to do in it, using wollen in each. Then write out the birthdays of your household in words rather than figures. With that you close the series on the language used every day of the year.

How to study this lesson

• Watch the lesson once end to end without stopping, to get the shape of it
• Watch it again, pausing at every new word and saying it aloud
• Write the fifteen words out by hand — writing fixes them better than reading
• Use three of the sentences the same day, even if only to yourself
• Do not move on until you can recall this vocabulary without looking

Where this lesson sits in the series

The series is twelve lessons in a deliberate order: each builds on the grammar and the vocabulary of the one before it. This is lesson 12 of twelve. Do not skip between them — skipping is the first cause of stalling at A1.

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between wollen and möchten?
wollen is a plain will and can sound blunt in a request; möchten is gentler and fits a shop or an office.

How is a date written in German?
Day, month, year, with a full stop after the day and the month: 15.03.2026. In speech the day is read as an ordinal.

Why es regnet?
Because German weather verbs have no subject of their own, so a dummy es fills the subject slot.

And after lesson twelve?
The A1 series is complete. The next step is to go through all twelve again without looking at the translation; what survives that second pass is your real store.

Watch the video

The video is on the OK+ channel on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aH6V_sU9Mg

Also on OK+

• Learn German A1 – Lesson 11: What shall I wear?
• Fifty German verbs – part one

A tool that shortens the road

The OK Plus DE app gathers German administrative calculators and form templates in one place, free, ad-free, in seven languages. Android and iPhone, from the same page:
Get the OK Plus DE app