Guten Tag! Today’s post is a little more interactive than recent ones. We are going to test your German proofreading skills. Are you ready? Let’s get started.

In a recent post, I shared an article about illegal ‘Coronapartys’ in Germany. In this post, I will share sentences from that article, but deliberately include Fehler (mistakes) in them. These could be spelling mistakes, grammar mistakes, or incorrect words/phrases. Your task is to proofread the sentences and see how many mistakes you can find! If you can correct the sentences, too, that will be even better. But the main objective here is to teach you to spot mistakes in German texts, based on your knowledge of German spelling and grammar.

Some things to consider include:

• Does the word require capitalisation?
• Is the gender correct? (der/die/das)
• Have any letters been missed out or added?
• Has the word been mixed up for a different word?
• Is an Umlaut missing, or not where it should be?

Before we get started, here is some (correct) terminology from the sentences you will proofread:

Die Polizei – police

Jugendlichen – youths/teenagers

sogennante – so-called

Donnerstagabend – Thursday evening

auflösen – to dissolve/disperse (past tense: aufgelöst)

sangen – sang (plural past tense of singen-to sing)

gut gelaunt – in a good mood

Das Zusammentreffen – meeting

größerer Gruppen – larger groups

Risiko – risk

Ausbreitung – spread

das Verhalten – behaviour

Bevölkerung – people/population

Wochenende – weekend

anschauen – to look at/observe

Now, here are the five sentences! Remember, there is at least one mistake in each one – how many can you find, and can you correct the mistakes? The answers will be at the bottom of this post, underneath the newsletter form. Viel Glück!

1. Polizi lost Corona-Party von jugendlichen auf
   (Police disperse youths having Coronaparty)
2. Die Polizei hat am Montagbend eine sogenannte Corona-Party von Jugendlichen in Staßfurt in Sachsen-Anhalt aufgelöscht
   (The police dispersed youths having a so-called Coronaparty in Staßfurt in Saxony-Anhalt on Thursday evening.)
3. Nach Polizeiangaben sangen die Jugendlichen sichtlich Gut Gelaunt “Corona, Corona”.
   (According to police reports, the youths were in visibly good spirits, singing ‘Corona, Corona’.)
4. Der Zusammentreffen größerer Gruppen stellt ein erhebliches risiko bei der Ausbreitung des Coronavirus dar.
   (Meeting in larger groups poses a considerable risk for the spread of Coronavirus.)
5. Wir werden uns die verhalten der Bevölkerung an diesem Wochende anschauen.
   (We will observe people’s behaviour this weekend.)

How many Fehler did you find? The answers are below the newsletter form in this post, so scroll down when you’re ready to see how you did!

Thanks to Chelsea from the Swedish blog for providing the inspiration for this blog post. If you’re interested in the Swedish language, go and check out the Swedish version of this post here.

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Answers:

1. Polizei was missing the ‘e’; the o in löst should have an Umlaut (from the separable verb auflösen); Jugendlichen is a noun and should have been capitalised:

Polizei löst Corona-Party von Jugendlichen auf.

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2. Donnerstag was changed to Montag (Monday); Abend was missing the letter A (lowercase here because it is part of the word Donnerstagabend); aufgelöscht should have been aufgelöst :

Die Polizei hat am Donnerstagabend eine sogenannte Corona-Party von Jugendlichen in Staßfurt in Sachsen-Anhalt aufgelöst.

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3. Gut Gelaunt should have been in lowercase :

Nach Polizeiangaben sangen die Jugendlichen sichtlich gut gelaunt “Corona, Corona”.

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4. The article for Zusammentreffen is ‘das’, not ‘der’; Risiko is a noun and should have been capitalised :

Das Zusammentreffen größerer Gruppen stellt ein erhebliches Risiko bei der Ausbreitung des Coronavirus dar.

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5. The article for Verhalten is ‘das’, not ‘die’; Verhalten is a noun and should be capitalised; Wochenende was spelt incorrectly :

Wir werden uns das Verhalten der Bevölkerung an diesem Wochenende anschauen.

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Here is the whole article to read for yourself: Click here.