German sentence construction
Many thanks once again to Rüdiger and Domasala for your replies. As always these are extremely informative (and very much appreciated).

I always realised that the concept of gender in German was important, but as you learn more you certainly do realise that knowing these are absolutely pivotal to understanding the language.

I wondered whether the different ways Domasala highlighted of phrasing this particular question are something that can be ‘learned’ in German.

For example the sentence ‘Es befinden sich Kreise auf ihm’ would translate in English as ‘It finds itself creases on it’ which we would simply not say. We would not for example, use the phrase ‘it finds itself’- that sounds very formal, stilted and long-winded to English ears!!

Is this way of constructing the sentence guided by grammatical rules or rather something that a native speaker (or a very experienced German speaker) would ‘just know’?

Laura

Question

German sentence construction
Many thanks once again to Rüdiger and Domasala for your replies.  As always these are extremely informative (and very much appreciated).  

I always realised that the concept of gender in German was important, but as you learn more you certainly do realise that knowing these are absolutely pivotal to understanding the language. 

I wondered whether  the different ways Domasala highlighted of phrasing this particular question  are something that can be ‘learned’ in German.

For example the sentence ‘Es befinden sich Kreise auf ihm’  would translate in English as ‘It finds itself creases on it’ which we would simply not say.  We would not for example, use the phrase ‘it finds itself’- that sounds very formal, stilted and long-winded to English ears!!

Is this way of constructing the sentence guided by grammatical rules or rather something that a native speaker (or a very experienced German speaker) would ‘just know’?

Laura

Answer

Words are important. You'll need them. Your vocabulary increases steadily. And that will be fine. But you can't learn another language translating word by word. The next step is to learn complete phrases and situations. What would you say in English and what's the corresponding expression in German? Often, it would look similar, but not the same. And what about style? Improper use would sound funny. Strange. Wrong.

You will do fine...

Wörter sind wichtig. Du wirst sie brauchen (/benötigen). Dein Wortschatz wächst ständig. Und das ist gut so. Aber du kannst eine andere Sprache nicht lernen, indem du wörtlich übersetzt. Der nächste Schritt wird sein, ganze Redewendungen (/Sätze) und Situationen zu lernen. Was würdest du auf Englisch (/im Englischen) sagen und was ist der passende Satz auf Deutsch (/im Deutschen)? Oft würde es ähnlich aussehen, aber nicht gleich sein. Und was ist mit dem Stil? Unpassender Gebrauch würde lustig klingen. Merkwürdig. Falsch.

Du wirst das schon schaffen!

Answer

Hello Laura,

Those are rather expressions with steady meanings, that a German native learns earlier through hearing and intuitive recognition.
The expression "sich befinden" means in your context "to be" and it sounds very natural for a German native.
A literal translation from German to English will lead to those incomprehensible sentences. 
You better learn to think "German" while learning it and develop slowly a sense to grasp the meaning of those expressions in their own language.

Answer

And again, I can not be silent, as my thoughts go on on and deal further with your questions...

I think you can develop that "feeling" by reading, hearing and using the language. Other people might that call just "practice" :-)

One method I found out to be useful for myself is just learning a lesson by heart, or if you want to have a poetic style you can do that with poems...

One of the richness of the German language is its variety. You have tens of possibilities to express something, each possibility may have a slightly different meaning or have a slightly different emphasis on one certain aspect of the sentence. Again I believe listening and practicing is the key to understand and use the differences.

Answer

Hm, I think you can not learn it, may be you can feel it.

I always thought that you must develop a feeling for a foreign language, a feeling for what sounds good, which expression is smooth or deep.

This approach has often helped me to find words in English, which is in fact very similar to German in many ways and in other ways it isn't. But also in French which is not as easy for a German native as English is.