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Unit Three
Unit Three
Different patterns
Sein is an example of an irregular verb where the endings change even more
drastically. This is very similar to English, where ‘to be’ has very irregular
forms in the present tense: ‘I am’, ‘you are’, ‘he/she/it is’, ‘we are’, ‘you are’,
‘they are’.
haben sein
ich (I) habe bin
du (you, informal) hast bist
Sie (you, formal) haben sind
er/sie/es (he/she/it) hat ist
wir (we) haben sind
ihr (you, plural, informal) habt seid
Sie (you, plural, formal) haben sind
sie (they) haben sind
It is only for du and er/sie/es that the finite verb form is irregular – you need to
drop the b from the stem:
Examples
Use of haben
Haben is an important verb which you will be using a lot. It is used to form
tenses just as English uses ‘to have’:
Useful phrases
Here are a few useful phrases with haben:
Examples:
And there is, of course Shakespeare: To be or not to be, that is the question.
In German this would be: Sein oder Nicht-Sein. Das ist die Frage.
Use of sein
Like haben, sein is an important verb and you will be using it a lot. It is used
to form tenses and other grammatical forms.
For more irregular verb endings in the present tense see Unit 3.
To remind yourself of the regular endings see Unit 2.
Exercise 4.1
Complete the following sentences with the correct finite verb forms of haben.
Example: Ich eine Schwester.
Ich habe eine Schwester.
Exercise 4.2
Use the appropriate finite verb forms of sein to complete the following short
dialogues.
Exercise 4.3
Now write out the full present tense (for all persons: ich, du, Sie, er/sie/es, wir,
ihr, Sie, sie) of the verbs (1) haben and (2) sein.
Exercise 4.4
Checklist ✓
1 Do you know all the finite verb forms (in the present tense)
for sein by heart?