A Practical Look at the Classic German Language Textbook
If you are learning German on your own or teaching it, you will eventually run across this material. It was originally published decades ago and has gone through many printings. The core book is structured around grammar explanations in German with exercises, vocabulary lists, and dialogues aimed at learners who do not have a German background. It covers basic through intermediate material, moving from simple noun cases into verb conjugations, prepositions, word order, and subordinate clauses. I have used similar textbooks in classroom settings over the years. The Schulzgriesbach material has strengths, but it also has some quirks that trip people up if they approach it blindly.
Where to Find Schulzgriesbach Deutsche Sprachlehre Fur Auslander
The book exists in multiple editions and formats. You will find it on eBay, AbeBooks, and ZVAB, usually listed with slightly different titles depending on the printer. Amazon sometimes has copies too, though availability varies by region. For digital versions, you can check project Gutenberg or academic repository sites, but those tend to be older scans rather than polished ebooks. If you want something current and complete, buying a used paperback copy is usually the fastest route. It often arrives within a week depending on where the seller is located. I recommend searching by the full German title rather than an English translation of it, since sellers use the original title in their listings. That will save you time looking through irrelevant results.
How the Book Is Actually Structured
Each chapter introduces a grammar point, gives you model sentences in German, then presents exercises. The exercises are mostly fill-in-the-blank, sentence transformation, and matching. There are reading passages interspersed, but they are functional rather than engaging. The vocabulary lists at the end of chapters are organized thematically. Some editions include audio CDs, but most of the later reprints dropped that format entirely. Here is one thing most people miss: the exercises build on each other cumulatively. If you skip ahead without doing the earlier grammar practice, you will hit walls when the book introduces dependent clause word order because the fundamentals were never properly reinforced in your working memory. I learned that the hard way when a student tried to rush through the first three chapters in a single week. They managed to produce broken sentences across the board. We went back and spent two sessions just on noun case identification before moving forward, and everything clicked after that.
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What Works Well and What Does Not
The grammar explanations are precise. That is genuinely its main value. The book does not waste space on fluff. If you need to understand why certain prepositions trigger the dative case, this book will tell you straight. It uses examples drawn from everyday life, not literary texts, which makes the material accessible for beginners. The weakness is the dialogue quality. Many of the conversations feel stiff and outdated even for when the book was first published. Native speakers do not talk like that. If you are preparing for real conversation, supplement this with podcasts, YouTube channels, or modern graded readers. The textbook can get you through A2 to early B1 level if you work through it consistently. Past that point, you need additional materials because the content simply does not go far enough. Another practical issue: the answer key is included at the back of the book in most editions, but some of the exercise solutions are ambiguous. I once spent about twenty minutes trying to determine whether a particular exercise accepted both "während" and "wahrend" as correct answers before I realized the key itself had a typo from the printing. This is rare but it happens, especially in older print runs. Always double-check suspicious answers against a dictionary or an online grammar reference rather than assuming the key is infallible.
Recommended Approach for Self-Study
Work through one chapter per week. Do every exercise before moving on. Use a separate notebook to write out the model sentences by hand, because the physical act of writing helps cement word order patterns more than typing them does. When the book introduces a new grammatical concept, look up two or three additional examples online to confirm the rule. The textbook is reliable but occasionally terse, and extra examples prevent misunderstanding. Pair the book with a good German dictionary app. I use a combination of Leo.org and DerDieDas for quick lookups. The textbook vocabulary lists are useful but incomplete, and relying solely on them will leave gaps in your active vocabulary.
Bottom Line
This textbook is solid for structured grammar study. It is not entertaining. It is not comprehensive at higher levels. But for a learner who wants a systematic, no-nonsense path through German grammar from absolute beginner through intermediate, it remains one of the more reliable options available. Buy a recent printing if you can, use the answer key carefully, and do not expect the dialogues to sound natural. That last point alone will save you frustration.
