Lesson 1 - Wat is dit?

Intro



This lesson gives you a brief introduction to the Dutch language. You'll learn your first Dutch words, you'll get an idea of how sounds relate to writing in Dutch, you'll get familiar with 'niet' and 'geen' and you'll be introduced to 'de' and 'het'.



In Dutch, the relationship between writing and speaking is sometimes quite different from English. Vowels are often pronounced differently, the 'r' and the 'g' are pronounced in a 'hard to learn' way for most foreigners and, unlike English and French, the letters that are written are usually pronounced.

Take the words 'knie' and 'dame', for example:

  • de knie (the knee)
  • de dame (the lady)

    • The only letter that is quite often not pronounced, is the -n at the end of a word:
  • wij werken (we work)

    • Nevertheless, in many aspects, Dutch looks like English. The next text demonstrates this, by not being that hard to understand (except perhaps for 'zwart' meaning 'black' and 'het' meaning 'the'), simply because a lot of Dutch words look like English words:

    Text 1.1 - Dit is...
  • Wat is dit?
  • Dit is een pen.
  • Is de pen zwart?
  • Ja, de pen is zwart



  • Wat is dit?
  • Dit is een boek.
  • Is het boek rood?
  • Nee, het boek is groen.



    • You might have noticed that there are two definite articles (words meaning 'the' in English): 'de' and 'het'. It might be interesting to know that masculine and feminine words have 'de' and neuter words have 'het', but that doesn't always help you that much, because in most cases there's no way of telling wether a word is masculine, feminine or neuter. Only for people and animals this might help you. Like in:






    Text 1.2 - Is dit een pen?
    Is dit een pen?
  • Nee, dat is geen pen,
    dat is een potlood.


  • Is dit een boek?
  • Nee, dat is geen boek.
    Dat is een map.
  • Is de map oranje?
  • Nee, de map is niet oranje.
    De map is geel.





    • You could say 'geen pen' means 'not a pen' or just 'no pen'. In fact 'geen' is used for nouns and 'niet' is used for other types of words:





    Text 1.3 - Alfabet
    A B C D E F G H I J K L M
    N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

    Study this well, it might get you into trouble if you don't no how to spell in Dutch! Pay special attention to the A, E, I and IJ




    Text 1.4 - Welke kleur...?
  • Welke kleur heeft deze auto?
  • Deze auto is wit.
    Die auto is blauw.


  • Dit huis is groot,
    dat huis is klein.
    		•
  • Welke kleur is dit?
  • Deze kleur is bruin.

    • This and that in Dutch translate as follows:

    In short (hier - over here, daar - over there):

    x hier daar
    de deze die
    het dit dat




    Vocabulary
    het alfabet the alphabet
    de auto the car
    blauw blue
    bruin brown
    het boek the book
    daar there, over there
    dat that
    de the
    deze this, these
    die that, those
    dit this, these
    een a, an
    geel yellow
    goed good
    groot, grote big
    groen green
    heeft has
    het it, the
    hier here, over here
    het huis the house
    ja yes
    het kind the child
    klein, kleine small
    de kleur the color
    de man the man
    de map the folder
    nee no
    oranje orange
    de pen the pen
    het potlood the pencil
    rood red
    de vrouw the women
    wat what
    welk, welke which
    wit white
    zwart black




    More ...

  • Before you move on to the next chapter you should study:
  • To get familiar with some Dutch words, you could stick notes with the appropriate words in Dutch on objects around you.

    Here's a list to start with:


    • Lession anteriour       Lession seguiente

    Dutchification- Nederlandse Aaftaalingers                   Platina van Meer