AN EMPIRICAL BASE FOR TEACHING THE PAST TENSE IN GERMAN AS A FOREIGN-LANGUAGE

The selection and sequence of grammar remains an unresolved issue for foreign language teachers. A survey of three leading German textbooks revealed little coherence and lack of authenticity in the presentation of the different German past tense forms. The present study offers an empirical analysis of native speech data as a base for teaching the p ast tense in German as a foreign language. Interviews with 75 native s peakers showed that: 1) the present perfect serves as the dominant pas t tense form for main verbs in the German colloquial standard; 2) moda l verbs, the copula sein 'be,' haben 'have,' and certain formulaic exp ression occur in the preterite; and 3) the use of the past tense forms is linked to contextual and social factors. A German syllabus, then, must include a discussion of verb type when presenting the everyday us e of the German preterite and present perfect. The study points to the situational and social contexts influencing the use of grammatical st ructures rather than merely presenting contextless rules governing the ir use.