The Perfekt with sein: moving and changing state
CEFR A2 · part 1
edumaterial's parts within the level. The European framework does not subdivide them.
The dative: dem, der, dem and den + -nPutting any phrase into the dative: seeing that the marking travels in the article…The seven prepositions that take the dative: mit, nach, aus, zu, von, bei, seitAutomatically putting whatever follows these seven into the dative, without stopping to…Verbs that take the dative: helfen, danken, gefallen, gehören, schmeckenRecognising the dozen German verbs that take a dative rather than a direct object, and…The Perfekt with haben: the past that people actually speakTelling any past event the way Germans do when they speak: haben conjugated in second…The participle: ge- -t, ge- -en, and the ones with no ge-Building the participle of any verb: the ge- -t mould for regular ones, ge- -en for…The six modals: können, müssen, wollen, dürfen, sollen, mögenUsing the six modals with their odd conjugation —first and third person are identical…The rule, in three lines
A handful of verbs build the Perfekt with sein instead of haben, and there is no list to memorise: two questions do it. Does the subject end up somewhere ELSE? gehen, kommen, fahren, fliegen, laufen. Does the subject end up in another STATE? aufstehen, einschlafen, aufwachen, sterben, werden. If yes, the auxiliary is sein. Plus three that meet neither and take sein anyway: sein, bleiben and passieren.
The usual slip. Using haben for everything, because it is the auxiliary you learnt first and it covers ninety per cent. The fine trap is that the same verb can take both: Ich habe getanzt is «I danced» and Ich bin nach Hause getanzt is «I danced my way home». The verb does not decide: whether the subject moves does.
Why it catches you out. English is in the same boat as Spanish: it used to say «he is come» —it survives in «he is risen»— and now uses «have» for everything. So there is no living model. The good news is that the German rule is short and mechanical, and it is not about the meaning of the verb but about where the subject ends up.