An empty café before opening time: tap each thing in the picture, then give it its article.
1-chen makes every word neuter
2Devices in -er are masculine — but watch die Maschine
3The front part never decides
Why this matters
A picture hunt instead of a deck: one small, cosy café before opening time, with a counter and nobody in it with 32 things to find in it, every one an everyday noun — der Tresen, die Kaffeemaschine, das Milchkännchen, the cake on the counter and the croissant on the table. The prompt asks a question like Wo ist der Teppich? and you tap the object in the picture. A tap on the wrong object tells you what you hit and you keep looking; after three misses the right one is shown. Each find shows its label, coloured by its gender, then leaves a small tick in that colour, so you can see what you have already found. Once you have passed a run, the hunt gets harder: the prompt hides the article (Wo ist ___ Kaffeemaschine?), and after the find you pick der, die or das yourself. No object is asked twice in the same run.
Rule · 1 of 3
-chen makes every word neuter
The ending -chen (and -lein) makes a thing small, and it always makes it das, whatever the word was before. Die Kanne is a big jug; the little milk jug on the table is das Milchkännchen. The vowel often gets an umlaut too: Kanne → Kännchen.
das Milchkännchen, Plural: -milk jug
die Teekanne, Plural: -nteapot (die Kanne)
Quick check
Milchkännchen steht neben dem Glas.
Watch out · 2 of 3
Devices in -er are masculine — but watch die Maschine
A device named with -er, the thing that does the job, is der: der Toaster, der Wasserkocher, der Mülleimer is the odd one out that is masculine without being a machine. Do not let the coffee fool you: die Kaffeemaschine takes its article from die Maschine.
der Wasserkocherkettle
die Kaffeemaschinecoffee machine (die Maschine)
Quick check
Which article goes with Toaster?
Memory trick · 3 of 3
The front part never decides
Das Wasser is neuter, but at the front of a word it changes nothing: der Wasserkocher (der Kocher), der Wasserhahn (der Hahn). The same trick works all over this room: die Wanduhr (die Uhr), der Regenschirm (der Schirm), der Schirmständer (der Ständer).
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