Breakdown of Die Kinder spielen mit dem Fußball im Garten.
Questions & Answers about Die Kinder spielen mit dem Fußball im Garten.
In German, plurals are usually not formed by adding -s the way English often does.
- The singular is das Kind (the child).
- The plural is die Kinder (the children).
The ending -er is one of several common plural endings in German (-e, -er, -en, -n, -s, or no change). You simply have to learn the plural form with each noun.
The article die is the regular plural definite article for all genders in the nominative case, so:
- das Kind → die Kinder
- der Hund → die Hunde
- die Frau → die Frauen
All nouns in German are capitalized, regardless of where they appear in the sentence.
- Die Kinder spielen …
- Ich sehe den Garten.
- Wir mögen Fußball.
So Kinder, Garten, and Fußball must all be written with a capital first letter, because they are nouns.
The preposition mit always takes the dative case in German.
- Masculine, nominative: der Fußball
- Masculine, dative: dem Fußball
So with mit, you must say:
- mit dem Fußball (with the football/soccer ball)
Mit den Fußball would mix dative plural (den) with a singular noun (Fußball), so it’s wrong here.
You can sometimes drop the article and say mit Fußball if you mean it in a more general sense (e.g. playing soccer as a sport), but in this sentence it clearly refers to a specific ball, so German prefers mit dem Fußball.
Mit can mean different things in English depending on context:
Together with someone
- Ich spiele mit dir. → I play with you (together).
Using something (as an instrument)
- Ich schreibe mit einem Stift. → I write with a pen.
In Die Kinder spielen mit dem Fußball, mit dem Fußball means using the football as the object they are playing with. It’s not about playing together with the ball as a partner; the ball is the thing they use in their play.
Im is simply the contracted (shortened) form of in dem:
- in dem Garten → im Garten
German often contracts preposition + definite article when it’s common and sounds more natural:
- in dem → im
- an dem → am
- bei dem → beim
- zu dem → zum
So im Garten and in dem Garten are grammatically equivalent; im Garten is just the usual, more natural form in everyday German.
The preposition in is a two-way preposition. It can take:
- Dative, when it describes a location (where something is).
- Accusative, when it describes movement to a place (where something is going).
Compare:
Die Kinder spielen im Garten.
→ They are in the garden (location, dative: im = in dem Garten).Die Kinder gehen in den Garten.
→ They are going into the garden (movement to, accusative: in den Garten).
In the given sentence, the children are already in the garden, not moving there, so German uses the dative: im Garten.
The genders are:
- das Kind (neuter)
- der Garten (masculine)
- der Fußball (masculine)
Unfortunately, in German you often cannot reliably guess the gender just from the word; you need to learn each noun with its article:
- das Kind
- der Garten
- der Fußball
However, there are some patterns:
- Many nouns ending in -chen, -lein, -ment, -tum, -um are neuter (like das Kindchen, das Zentrum).
- Many nouns ending in -en for places or natural things can be masculine (der Garten, der Hafen), but not always.
So the safest strategy: always memorize nouns together with their article.
In a main clause in German, the conjugated verb must be in second position (the V2 rule).
In the sentence:
- Die Kinder (position 1 – the subject)
- spielen (position 2 – the verb)
- mit dem Fußball im Garten (rest of the sentence)
You can move other elements to the first position for emphasis, but spielen must stay second:
- Im Garten spielen die Kinder mit dem Fußball.
- Mit dem Fußball spielen die Kinder im Garten.
- Die Kinder spielen im Garten mit dem Fußball.
All of these are correct. What’s fixed is: the finite verb (here, spielen) stays in second place in a normal statement.
The verb spielen is conjugated according to the subject die Kinder (they, third person plural):
- ich spiele (I play)
- du spielst (you play – singular informal)
- er/sie/es spielt (he/she/it plays)
- wir spielen (we play)
- ihr spielt (you play – plural informal)
- sie spielen (they play / you play – formal)
Die Kinder = sie (they), so you need the 3rd person plural form:
- Die Kinder spielen … → They play …
Yes, and it would be a bit different in meaning:
Die Kinder spielen Fußball im Garten.
→ The children are playing soccer (the sport) in the garden.Die Kinder spielen mit dem Fußball im Garten.
→ The children are playing with the football (the physical ball) in the garden.
The version without mit dem usually refers more to the game/sport. The version with mit dem Fußball emphasizes the object, the ball they are using.
Yes, you can, but the meaning changes subtly.
Die Kinder spielen …
→ Refers to specific children known from context (the children we are talking about).Kinder spielen …
→ More general / indefinite: children (in general) are playing …
So:
- Kinder spielen mit dem Fußball im Garten.
→ Children are playing with the football in the garden. (Some children; not a specific group already introduced.)
In many real contexts you’ll use die Kinder because you’re referring to specific children (e.g. the neighbor’s children).
Yes, both are natural and grammatical; German word order is quite flexible as long as the verb stays in second position:
Im Garten spielen die Kinder mit dem Fußball.
→ Emphasis: the place (in the garden).Mit dem Fußball spielen die Kinder im Garten.
→ Emphasis: the thing they play with (with the football).
All of these versions are correct:
- Die Kinder spielen mit dem Fußball im Garten.
- Im Garten spielen die Kinder mit dem Fußball.
- Mit dem Fußball spielen die Kinder im Garten.
The difference is mostly in emphasis and style, not in basic meaning.