als, wenn or wann: German's three ways of saying «when»
CEFR B1 · part 1
edumaterial's parts within the level. The European framework does not subdivide them.
If I could: the Konjunktiv II with würde, hätte and wäreTalking about what is not real: what you would do, would have, would be. With the short…The passive with werden: when what is done matters, not whoBuilding a German passive with its two pieces —werden conjugated and the participle at…The genitive: des, der, and the -s stuck onto the nounSaying whose something is with the fourth case: des Mannes, der Frau, des Kindes, der…Relative clauses: der, die, das again, and the verb at the endHooking a description onto a noun with der, die or das, choosing the form with two…The infinitive with zu: when it goes in and when it does notAttaching a second verb with zu, and knowing the few cases where it is NOT used: after…Reflexive verbs: sich, and the mich that is sometimes mirUsing the dozen reflexives that come up daily —sich freuen, sich interessieren, sich…The rule, in three lines
German has three words where your language has one. wann is for ASKING, directly or indirectly. als is for ONE time in the past: Als ich klein war. wenn is for everything else — repeated events, plus the present and the future. All three send the verb to the end except wann in a direct question.
The usual slip. Using wenn for a one-off past event, the commonest case when telling a story. «When I got to Berlin» is Als ich nach Berlin kam. wenn in the past means «whenever», so the sentence changes meaning without warning. The second mistake is using wann outside a question.
Why it catches you out. English uses «when» for all three too, and «whenever» for the repeated one, which is exactly wenn. So half the distinction is already there: whenever = wenn, question word = wann. What English has no word for is als, the single past event, and that is the one to build.