The seven prepositions that take the dative: mit, nach, aus, zu, von, bei, seit
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…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 Perfekt with sein: moving and changing stateDeciding in a second whether a verb takes haben or sein, using the two questions that…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
Seven prepositions ALWAYS put what follows into the dative, with no exceptions and nothing to work out: mit, nach, aus, zu, von, bei, seit. You learn them off by heart, like a shopping list, and from then on the case comes from the preposition and not from the meaning. They also give very common contractions: zu dem = zum, zu der = zur, von dem = vom, bei dem = beim.
The usual slip. Choosing between nach, zu and bei by translation. All three come out the same in your language and are not interchangeable in German: nach for towns and countries with no article, zu for people and for the place you are heading, bei for being at someone's or at a place. nach Berlin, zu Anna, bei Anna, and swapping one for another changes the sentence.
Why it catches you out. English uses «to» for both nach Berlin and zu Anna, and «at» for bei. What helps is that German splits by the kind of place: nach for towns and countries, zu for people and buildings you head for, bei for being at someone's. And seit is not just «since» plus a date: seit zwei Jahren means «for two years».