If you already mastered Polish grammar, or at least have a good grasp of the rules, but need a vocabulary boost, this one’s for you. The second part covers 11 short and engaging stories (listed separately in this article’s storybook section). The third part contains over 1,000 essential phrases that will come in handy when you visit Poland. The course focuses mainly on listening and speaking so it would go well with another book that focuses a little bit more on grammar. If you misuse you, people might give you a strange look or, in a worst case scenario, you could end up offending someone. In general, the informal ty is used between family members, friends, children and teenagers. Once a teenager turns 18 and gets their first ID card, they can expect everyone to call them by pan or pani. In reality, they need to wait a bit longer until they look more mature. Yes, there are many verb conjugations in Polish. But they can be divided into four main groups to make learning them easier.

Polish for Dummies by Daria Gabryanczyk | Goodreads

Nie być (n’ye bihch’) (not to be) So the whole quote is: Być albo nie być, oto jest pytanie! (bihch’ al-bo n’ye bihch’ o-to yest pih-ta-n’ye) (To be or not to be, that is the question!) Lubiȩ czytać (loo-bye chih-tach’) (I like to read) Nie lubiȩ czytać (n’ye loo-bye chih-tach’) (I don’t like reading) Getting familiar with the verb być, to be After you know how to introduce yourself, it’s time to become familiar with one of the fundamental verbs that let you talk about what country you come from, your nationality and lots more. Get acquainted with the verb być (bihch’) (to be) so that you can tell people where you’re from. As in English, this verb is irregular and your best approach is to learn it by heart. Table 3-1 shows how to conjugate być. Titled Czy jestem mała? in Polish, this picture book tells the story of a girl who worries about her size. She meets different animals as she ponders this question. Foolish Assumptions To write this book, I had to make some assumptions about you and what you want from a book called Polish For Dummies: You know no Polish. You’re not looking for a book to make you fluent in Polish; you just want to know some words, phrases and sentence constructions so that you can communicate basic information in Polish. You don’t want to have to memorise long lists of vocabulary words or a load of boring grammar rules. You want to have fun and discover a bit of Polish at the same time. If these statements apply to you, you’ve found the right book!As you can see, different parts of speech look different. There are always exceptions, but how a word looks is a good indicator of what it is. Meeting and greeting go hand in hand – or cheek to cheek The gesture that accompanies greetings or introductions depends on the type of situation and who you’re dealing with. In family situations, especially when you see someone after a long time, you can expect a hug The answer may be positive: Tak, ona jest z Francji (tak o-na yest sfran-tsyee) (Yes, she’s from France); or negative: Nie, ona nie jest z Francji. Jest z Kanady (n’ye o-na n’ye yest sfran-tsyee yest ska-na-dih) (No, she’s not from France. She’s In this part . . . This part focuses on everyday situations in which you may find yourself if you’re living in Poland or dealing with your Polish-speaking friends. The chapters in this part hone your small-talk skills and take you on shopping and dining excursions as well as explaining how to enjoy yourself the Polish way. Sprinkled throughout are cultural titbits that introduce you to people, places and things that are important in Polish culture.

Polish For Dummies by Daria Gabryanczyk | Perlego [PDF] Polish For Dummies by Daria Gabryanczyk | Perlego

Speaking English in Poland Although young Poles are eager to learn foreign languages, with English widely spoken in bigger cities, the foreign languages spoken by the older generation are Russian or German (the latter particularly popular in the west of the country). If you want to practise your Polish, your best bet is to go to a small town or village and simply enjoy being surrounded by Poles and the Polish language. Polish For Dummies may come in handy! Grammar problems are introduced in context so it does take some concentration and patience to fully grasp the rules. Dialogues introduce a lot of vocabulary, too. When learning a language, I would probably get one of each and supplement this with online resources, podcasts, films and conversation classes. But the choice is yours! Why I Wrote This Book Language exposes you to every aspect of the human condition, allowing you to study the past, understand the present and ponder the future. Language sometimes changes the ways in which people express various emotions and conditions. People are connected through their ability to speak, but you can go one step further – to understanding – by being able to communicate in another language. Very few things are as exciting as that! The best way to discover a new language is to immerse yourself in it. Listen to the way Polish sounds, concentrate on the pronunciation and look at how it’s written. By listening and repeating, you enter a new world of ideas and peoples. Acquiring Polish through immersion really does feel like a sort of magic. Endings for perfective verbs Perfective verbs use the present tense conjugation to form the future (see the ‘Being in the now with present tense’ section earlier in this chapter). For example, the perfective pomyśleć (po-mih-sh’lech’) (to think) follows the present tense conjugation of the imperfective myśleć (mih-sh’lech’) while keeping its perfective prefix po-. Table 2-14 shows future tense conjugations of the perfective verb pomyśleć.Polish has three types of conjugation. Each type has a separate set of endings. Try to learn one example for each type by heart so that when you come across a new verb, you can conjugate it correctly even if woken up in the middle of the night. Each conjugation takes its name from the endings of the first (ja) and second (ty) person singular. Hence, the conjugation in Table 2-4 is called the -m/-sz type. It’s based on the verb czytać (chih-tach’) (to read). If you’d like to practise your speaking skills, italki is a great place to start. You can either find a language exchange partner for free, pay for a non-professional language tutor, or pay for a professional language teacher. The general rule says that a voiced consonant changes to its silent form at the end of a word (chleb, bread, is pronounced as hlep) or before a silent consonant (podpisać, to sign, is pronounced pot-pee-sach’), both within one word or two words as in w Polsce (fpol-stse). However, consonant clusters are voiced if the last consonant of the cluster is voiced (you pronounce jest wesoły, is happy, as yezd ve-so-wih). You won’t be surprised to know that in some ‘special’ situations these rules don’t quite work. This Collins Polish dictionary includes grammar as well, so if you’d rather get one book only, that’s your best choice:

Polish: 6 Effective Ways to Learn Polish Quickly How to Learn Polish: 6 Effective Ways to Learn Polish Quickly

Polish Short Storiesintroduces rich and new but not too complex vocabulary. What’s great is that the translations are found at the end of each chapter so it won’t disturb your reading rhythm while you try to look for words in a dictionary. Albeit not ideal for absolute beginners, those who have already learned a bit of Polish will find this invaluable. The only downside is that there are no exercises so we suggest using this in conjunction with other references. underlined syllable more strongly, as it is a stressed syllable. Make your way to the ‘Searching for Stress and Blending Prepositions’ section later in this chapter to read more about the Polish stress. Geared towards learners who are going to Poland for holidays or business trips, the Easy Learning Polishaudio course introduces key vocabulary useful in important situations. The narrators guide listeners through 12 chapters of useful phrases and common day-to-day scenarios. Aside from the tables, the book also features puzzles, self-tests, and other challenges designed to instill a deeper understanding of Polish verbs. There are also lots of examples, plus indexes listing nearly 2,300 verbs.Conjugation refers to how verb forms differ depending on the person and number. Have a look at some different forms of the Polish verb “to be” ( być) in the examples below: Polish speakers tend to replace all possessive pronouns with swój (sfooy), swoja (sfo-ya) and swoje (sfo-ye) in sentences where the pronoun refers to the subject of the statement, as in the following examples: Adam idzie do kina ze swoją siostrą (a-dam ee-dj’ye To make sure you know Polish verbs well, it’s good to learn perfective and imperfective verbs together. That way, you’ll be sure that you can express yourself regardless of what you’re trying to say. 6. Final Thoughts