How Do You Actually Practice Conversation in a Language?

So how do you practice conversation? First of all, what do I mean by “conversation”? When I say conversation, I mean talking—basically, one person says something, the other understands (more or less), and then the other person responds and hopefully is understood in return. It sounds simple, but when we talk about practicing, we’re really talking about how to practice actual talking.

Now, here’s something interesting. In all the years I’ve been teaching—which is twenty years, I have been teaching German and English—I’ve seen a pattern with almost all my students who had previous language classes. It goes like this: There are all sorts of things to learn in a course. You learn new words or vocabulary, you read texts and try to understand them. There are writing exercises. You learn grammar, learning how to put the words together correctly. Maybe you learn about particular topics too.

And then, on top of that, you definitely should learn to speak. Because, let’s be honest, when people want to learn a foreign language, what they usually need most is speaking. If you want to move to Austria and you’re learning German, for example, what will you need most? You’ll need to speak to people who live there, or to start a job, or to talk to customers, your boss, or colleagues. Even if you’re working in an English-speaking company in Austria, many of your colleagues will speak German with each other. Or maybe you’re learning German to travel because you like Austria, Germany, or Switzerland—it always comes back to needing to have actual conversations, so speaking!

The Missing Piece: Speaking in Language Classes

Yet, despite all this, there’s something surprising: from what I’ve seen with every student I’ve ever taught, speaking—actual conversation—was almost completely missing from their language classes. Isn’t that strange? I believe this points to a real flaw in the educational system, and not just in one country.

Let’s compare this to something else. If you’re taking piano lessons, what’s the main thing you’ll do? You’ll play the piano! Yes, you’ll learn how to hold your hand, study music theory, even learn about the parts of a piano—but for sure, you’ll actually play music. When I had piano lessons, every week was the same: practice scales, learn about them (so this is theory and basically like learning new words in a language course), and then actually play a new piece. Nobody said, “Let’s just talk about music and never touch the piano” “Let’s learn only some scales and music theory and then in a couple of years we will start playing some pieces.”

But in German or English classes, and I bet it’s the same for most other languages, there’s very little actual talking being done. Isn’t that odd? When what we want to learn is speaking, most of us don’t do much of it.

What is the Solution: Conversation from the Beginning

So, what do I do differently? And what happens in our classes, whether it’s German at Better German, or English at Besser Lernen (yes, I also teach English), is that we start conversation early. Really early.

We don’t start reading at Level One in German—not until maybe the very end of the beginner level. But we do start conversation exercises much earlier. As soon as we’re able to put together a few complete sentences, we start our first conversation exercises. And honestly, it’s so important, and so easy to do.

Every skill has its method. We teach new words a certain way, we teach sentence patterns to help you say correct sentences, so you end up learning grammar through those patterns instead of dry grammar rules. And you also learn small words, reading, pronunciation, and yes, conversation.

Of all these, conversation exercises are the easiest. And maybe it’s the simplicity that confuses people. Here’s what we do: I write a subject on the board, or show it, or hand it to the person on a sheet of paper—depends if I’m in a group, one-on-one, or online.

Example of an Conversation Practice

Let’s take the very first conversation topic you’ll see in a Level One course: “Tell me about your family,” in German: Erzähl mir über deine Familie.

If it’s the first time, I’ll go through: Erzähl means “tell,” mir means “me,” über means “about,” deine Familie means “your family.” Then I’ll ask them to repeat it.

Then I say: “Good, now just tell me something about your family. I don’t care if it’s 100% correct. That’s not the point right now. Just say something about your family.” Usually, beginner answers sound like:
Ich habe eine große Familie.
Meine Mutter ist in Wien.
Meine Schwester, Anna, ist…
…and so on. Maybe,
Meine Tochter ist Karina. Karina ist schön.
And I’ll prompt, “Tell me more.” In German, “Mehr.”

They might continue,
Mein Mann ist Peter. Peter ist groß. Peter ist…
And so on. There might be mistakes – most likely there will be, but that does not matter at all.

At this stage—our students haven’t even really learned verbs beyond ist (“is”). They can say numbers, some basic adjectives, family members, and that’s about it. But you can still say quite a lot!

But Isn’t the Conversation too Simple?

Of course, every lesson we keep adding new words and new sentence patterns. And if you’re learning on your own, you’ll do the same. But this small exercise is where it all comes together. And here’s my advice: Don’t wait. Don’t sit quietly for two years in class, hoping that one day you’ll just start speaking fluently. That’s not how you learn a language. You need to start speaking early—even if you make mistakes. That’s normal. In fact, that’s the point. What I just described is what most beginners in my classes can do after just a few weeks—maybe ten or twenty hours of learning.

So, if you want to learn German, do that. Just start having conversations. Start early.

Keep It Simple—and Effective

If the other person doesn’t understand something, they should just ask, and you try to explain. If you can’t say it in German, explain it however you can. The goal is real communication: share information, make sure the other person understands. Then swap—let the other person talk. But this is important: we do not correct mistakes here! 

This is a super easy exercise. Leave it easy. Let it be easy. Don’t ruin it by “correcting”. If you want to help someone learn German, English, or any language, try this: Give them a simple prompt. Let them talk. Only ask for clarification if you really can’t figure out what they mean. Work it out together. Otherwise, just try to understand. Actually, it’s a good exercise for both sides! This can be practiced between two students, or with someone helping a learner. My experience is: if you allow it to be simple, it will be super effective. The higher the level, the more often we do conversation in class.

If you leave it that simple, it will work like a charm. 

If you want help learning German, I’m available—check the info below. But I’d really love to hear from you: What was your experience in language classes? Did you practice speaking? And what were your results?

Let me know!

Want to Join Me In Practicing?

🎙️ If you’d like to hear more about how this works in practice, I go deeper into the method in Episode 39 of the Better German podcast. You find it directly here: https://bettergerman.info/39. It walks you through exactly how to start speaking—even if you’re a total beginner—and why it’s so important not to focus on correcting mistakes too early. The goal isn’t perfection—it’s getting comfortable speaking freely first.

👉We’ve also built these ideas into the Better German Community, where you can join free live conversation classes, find practice partners through our MatchUp tool, and get support as you learn. If you want a place to try this kind of conversation practice, this is the place to start.