#german ch

[bluesmokefantom]

My pretty girl, Cleo!

[ubungmachtdenmeister]

Hallo! Wie geht's dir? :) I am a beginner in German (actually, I'd say I'm still at basics), but I already fell in love this language, hehe. Something that really annoys me, however, is the sound of the "ch" in words like "möchten" and "chatte", because I simply can't pronounce it easily since there is no equal sound in my native language. How can you pronounce this sound? Thanks for the attention and help :)

Hallo! Mir geht’s gut, danke, und dir? :)There’s no equivalent sound to the german “ch“‘s in my native language (English) either! I just had to listen and listen and practice and practice until I got a sound that’s kind of close. My “ch“‘s have definitely greatly improved over the past 5 years I’ve been learning German, but I’m sure they may still be a giveaway to a native that I’m not a native-german speaker! hahaThere are actually 2 “ch" sounds in german: “hard ‘ch’" and “soft ‘ch’". The Hard CH is used when the ‘ch’ follows a “hard" letter. These would be a, o, u, or au. So for example, in the words “Buch" (book) or “Loch" (hole). The Soft CH is used when the ‘ch’ follows a “soft" letter. These would be e, ä, i, ei, eu, äu, ö, or a consonant. So for example, in the words “ich" (I) or “Milch" (milk). After a while, your brain will start to notice the pattern, and you’ll just know (or remember) which CH is used in that word!So in your “möchten" example, the “ch" follows the "ö", so it would be a Soft CH. Your example “chatte" is kind of a bad example though, because “chatten" is a loan word from english. It doesn’t really come from german. So in this case, the “ch" would be pronounced as an english “ch". Like in the english word “church" (or the english word “chat"!). This is not a normal german “ch" sound though!So my best description of the german hard and soft ch sounds is breathing out from your throat, while the back of your tongue touches the top of your mouth. In the soft ch sound, your tongue is closer to the roof of your mouth, and makes a more “hissing" noise. For the hard “ch", try to think of a harder english “k" sound, but breathe the air over the top of your tongue. For the soft “ch", try to imagine a softer version of a cat hissing.If you search youtube for the german “ch" sound, there are a bunch of tutorials where native speakers will pronounce the sound slowly and clearly, and then in many different words. They’ll also try to explain how to pronounce it. It really does just take lots of listening and lots of practice.Don’t worry about it too much. I’m sure the “ch“‘s are one of the hardest german sounds to learn for non-natives. While you’re still working on pronouncing them, I would suggest you pronounce the hard “ch" kind of close to an english “k" sound, and the soft “ch" as a mix between an english “h" sound and an english “sh" sound. Native speakers are probably used to it being mispronounced, and will most likely know what you mean!Best of luck with your German! :)