Learn Hardcore German: Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer. - Grammar is sometimes difficult for me.

Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.

Grammar is sometimes difficult for me.

Breakdown of Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.

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Questions & Answers about Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.

Why is it mir and not mich?

mir is the dative form of ich (“I”), and this verb pattern requires the dative:

jemandem fällt etwas schwer
= something is difficult for someone

So in the sentence:

Grammatik = the thing that is difficult → subject (nominative)
mir = the person for whom it is difficult → indirect object (dative)

mich is the accusative form and would be wrong here, because fallen in this meaning does not take an accusative object. You always say:

Grammatik fällt mir schwer.
Mathe fällt ihm schwer.
Deutsch fällt uns schwer.

What does fallen mean here? Doesn’t it mean “to fall”?

Literally, fallen means “to fall”, but in the expression:

jemandem fällt etwas schwer

it has a more idiomatic meaning: “someone finds something difficult”.

A literal image would be “something falls heavy to someone”. In normal English we translate:

Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.
→ I sometimes find grammar difficult.
→ Grammar is sometimes difficult for me.

So here fallen is part of a fixed pattern expressing difficulty, not physical falling.

Is schwerfallen a separable verb?

Yes. Dictionaries usually list the verb as schwerfallen (one word), and it behaves like a separable verb:

Infinitive: schwerfallen
Present: es fällt mir schwer
Simple past: es fiel mir schwer
Perfect: es ist mir schwergefallen

In main clauses with a finite verb, the verb stem (fällt) goes to the second position and schwer goes to the end of the clause, just like other separable verbs:

Das fällt mir schwer.
Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.

Why do we say fällt mir schwer instead of just ist schwer für mich?

You can say:

Grammatik ist manchmal schwer für mich.
Grammatik ist manchmal schwierig für mich.

These are grammatically correct.

However, Grammatik fällt mir schwer is:

more idiomatic and natural,
slightly more personal: it focuses on the effort/burden for me, not just on the objective difficulty.

Very common patterns in German are:

Etwas fällt mir schwer. – I find something difficult.
Ich finde etwas schwierig/schwer. – I think something is difficult.

All of these work, but fällt mir schwer is a standard, very common way to say this.

Why is there no article? Why not Die Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer?

Both are possible:

Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.
Die Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.

Without an article, Grammatik is understood in a general, abstract sense, similar to English “Grammar is sometimes difficult for me.”

With die Grammatik, you can still mean grammar in general, but:

it can sound a bit more like you’re talking about a specific kind of grammar (e.g. German grammar, the grammar in this course), especially if the context is clear.

So the article is optional here. Omitting it is very natural when talking about grammar in general.

What case is Grammatik in this sentence?

Grammatik is in the nominative case because it is the subject of the sentence.

You can test this by replacing it with a pronoun:

Sie fällt mir manchmal schwer.
(sie = nominative feminine singular → points to nominative)

So the structure is:

Grammatik (Nominative, subject)
fällt (verb)
mir (Dative, “to me”)
manchmal schwer (adverb + predicate)

What is the difference between schwer and schwierig here?

Both schwer and schwierig can mean “difficult”, and often you can use either:

Grammatik ist schwer.
Grammatik ist schwierig.

In everyday speech, the difference is small. Roughly:

schwer → originally “heavy”; can feel a bit more emotional/subjective, about the effort or burden.
schwierig → more neutral “difficult/complex”, often about complexity or problematic situations.

Important: in the expression with fallen, you must use schwer, not schwierig:

✅ Es fällt mir schwer.
❌ Es fällt mir schwierig. (wrong)

So in Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer, only schwer works.

Where can I put manchmal? Are other word orders possible?

Yes, a few word orders are natural, with slightly different emphasis:

Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.
– neutral; very natural.
Manchmal fällt mir Grammatik schwer.
– puts emphasis on sometimes (not always).
Mir fällt Grammatik manchmal schwer.
– emphasises mir (“for me”), e.g. in contrast to others.

What you would not normally say is:

❌ Grammatik manchmal fällt mir schwer.
❌ Grammatik fällt manchmal mir schwer. (sounds odd)

So: put manchmal close to the verb phrase, typically after the object or after the pronoun in the middle field, or in first position for emphasis.

Can I say Grammatik fällt manchmal schwer für mich?

No, not like that. The idiom fällt … schwer requires a dative person, not für + accusative:

✅ Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.
✅ Mathe fällt vielen Schülern schwer.

If you want to use für mich, change the structure:

✅ Grammatik ist manchmal schwer für mich.
✅ Grammatik ist manchmal schwierig für mich.

But you should not combine fällt schwer with für mich:

❌ Grammatik fällt manchmal schwer für mich.

Why don’t we say Es fällt mir manchmal Grammatik schwer with es?

You use dummy es when the real subject is a clause or infinitive phrase, and you don’t want to put that long subject in first position:

Es fällt mir schwer, Deutsch zu sprechen.
Es fällt mir schwer, früh aufzustehen.

Here, the real subject is “Deutsch zu sprechen” / “früh aufzustehen”.

In Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer, the subject is just the simple noun Grammatik, so you do not need es. You normally would not say:

❌ Es fällt mir Grammatik manchmal schwer.

When you have a simple noun as subject, you usually put that noun in the subject position instead of using dummy es.

How do I say “German grammar sometimes is difficult for me” with this structure?

You just add the adjective deutsch in front of Grammatik and use the correct adjective ending:

Die deutsche Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer.

Notes:

deutsche gets an -e because Grammatik is feminine singular with the definite article die.
Using die here is very natural, because you’re talking about the specific grammar of the German language: die deutsche Grammatik.

How do I change this sentence for other persons and tenses?

The pattern stays the same:
[subject] + fällt + [dative person] + (manchmal) + schwer

Present tense, different persons:

Grammatik fällt mir manchmal schwer. – to me
Grammatik fällt dir manchmal schwer. – to you (singular, informal)
Grammatik fällt ihm/ihr manchmal schwer. – to him/her
Grammatik fällt uns manchmal schwer. – to us
Grammatik fällt euch manchmal schwer. – to you (plural)
Grammatik fällt ihnen manchmal schwer. – to them

Past (Präteritum):

Grammatik fiel mir manchmal schwer.

Perfect (Perfekt):

Grammatik ist mir manchmal schwergefallen.

So you mainly change mir to the correct dative pronoun and conjugate fallen as usual.