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:

• de man (- the man)
• de vrouw (- the women)
• het kind (- the child)

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:

• geen man - no man
• niet goed - not good

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:

• For 'de' words this is 'deze' and that is 'die'
• For 'het' words this is 'dit' and that is 'dat'

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:

• Grammar pages: 'Of course, 'de' and 'het' (theory + exercises)
• Grammar pages: basic pronunciation and spelling
• Lists & sounds: colors

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:

• the chair       - de stoel
• the door        - de deur
• the table       - de tafel
• the couch       - de bank
• the tv          - de televisie
• the cupboard    - de kast
• the bookcase    - de boekenkast
• the wall        - de muur
• the ash tray    - de asbak
• the carpet      - het vloerkleed
• the rug         - het kleedje
• the lamp        - de lamp
• the window      - het raam
• the clock       - de klok
• the phone       - de telefoon
• the plant       - de plant