Stufe B2.1 - Level B2.1

Starting B2 at LMU

Although I study at the Munich Technical University (Technische Universität München), the German course offered here is an intensive one, so I decided to study German at another university in Munich. This university is called Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, or just LMU. The lectures are conducted by the International University Club München (IUCM). You can get more info about different courses they offer by following this link. At the time of this writing the price is € 105 for LMU and ERASMUS students studying at LMU; for others it is € 135. Most of the language courses are open for everyone, namely even non-students can enroll for the courses, so I strongly advise you to check the links out if you are in Munich.

As with any other language institute, I had to take a placement test for German language. The exam at LMU had two sections: grammar and vocabulary. Everything was in the form of 'fill in the blanks'. First section tested essential grammar constructs. I had gone through my A2.1, A2.2 and B1.1 posts before the exam, and that helped me a lot. This section was easy. As for the latter section, we were given four texts with increasing levels of difficulty in terms of the words used and the sentence structure. The texts were riddled with blanks and we had to find appropriate words to fill those blanks with, whilst understanding the gist of the text.

Finally the exam was over and we were told that we would know the result in a weeks' time. As you can probably tell, the exam was a week ago.

I was surprised and anxious when I got the result. I was put in Kurs 5, i.e. B2.1 level. According to the European Langauage Standard, and as explained on this page, here is a list of things one is able to do after he passes B2:

• ... understand the main contents of complex texts on specific or abstract subjects and specialist discussions in your own field of knowledge
• ... communicate so spontaneously and fluently that a normal conversation with native speakers is possible without great effort on both sides,
• ... express yourself on a broad range of topics in a clear and precise way, explain your point of view on a current issue and enumerate advantages and disadvantages of several possibilities.

For this course, we are not going to be using any book. So, I don't have any book that I can recommend for you guys at the moment. Nevertheless, I will somehow try to upload everything that I learn during the lectures.

I can only say that the lessons at Goethe Institute were A-class. I want to acknowledge them for any German that I know today. Learning German at LMU is for sure going to be a fun and I am looking forward to sharing the experience with you all.

Remember, whatever I learn, you learn as well.