ABOUT MONEY IN POLISH

PIENIĄDZE, KASA, FORSA... OR WORDS FOR „MONEY“ IN POLISH

Today we want to talk about money (o pieniądzach – locative). As you know, money (pieniądze nominative, plural in Polish) doesn‘t bring hapiness but it’s better to mieć pieniądze (accusative; have money) than nie mieć pieniędzy (genitive; not to have money), because z pieniędzmi (instrumental; with money) in your pocket life is easier. Let’s take a closer look at Polish money (przyjrzyjmy się pieniądzom – dative).

In your Polish class (check here if you’re looking for interesting Polish courses) you will definitely learn that the word pieniądze is most often used in plural. Well, who wouldn’t prefer to have them in a larger amount ;-) Naturally, the singular form pieniądz exists, but it’s used much less frequently.

Money has many names in spoken language, and both native Polish users and foreigners learning Polish know very well how creative Polish may be and how many terms it may create to name one object. In slang pieniądze may be referred to as kasa, forsa, szmal or even sałata (literally: lettuce) or kapusta (literally: cabbage).

ZA ZŁOTÓWKĘ (for a zloty) – ON POLISH CURRENCY

Polish currency is, of course, złoty. A one-zloty coin is commonly known as złotówka and if something costs 1zl, we say that it kosztuje złotówkę. Money may be used in form of gotówka (cash), which means monety (coins) commonly known as drobniaki (small change), or banknoty (banknotes), or in form of karty płatnicze, debetowe and kredytowe (payment, debit and credit cards), informally called plastik. We can płacić 

gotówką, i.e. pay in cash,

or płacić kartą, i.e. pay by card
(check our fb page for more interesting facts about the Polish language).

In order to get some cash you may use a bankomat (ATM) to wypłacić (withdraw) or simply wziąć (take) it from your konto bankowe (bank account). Then we can wydawać (spend) the money. And if you are oszczędny (thrifty), you can put the money in your current account or lokata (deposit account) and then you oszczędzasz (save) it. Thanks to that in some time you will be able to look at your wyciąg bankowy (bank statement) and say with a smile: Oh, moje pieniądze (my money – vocative)!

IDEAS FOR POLISH SYLWESTER (NEW YEAR'S EVE PARTY)

The end of the old year and the beginning of the new one is time for fun as well as for  New Year's resolutions. It’s a good idea to put learning Polish among the latter and to think of signing up for a language course (find out here about interesting Polish language courses for foreigners).
However, first, there’s the night between 31st December and 1st January. It’s called sylwester in Poland (check here to find out about the origin of the name) and there are many ways to spend it.

LARGE OUTDOOR PARTY, WE ARE NOT AFRAID OF WINTER

If you enjoy having fun with a large group of people, usually strangers, and you would like to attend a really good concert, that may be a perfect idea to spend the last night of the old year. Such events take place in Poland in nearly every city and town, usually in rynek (market square), or the main town/city square, or at a stadium. Their main advantages are Polish stars and starlets on stage and the fact that they are free. Just put on some warm clothes, take something to make toasts with and fun guaranteed.

WARM WITH GOOD (POLISH) MUSIC

Those who aren’t fond of crowds and low temperatures may attend one of the events held by clubs, cinemas and concert halls. If you want to dance, be at ease all night and not think too much about what to wear, you can go to a club for a New Year's party (impreza sylwestrowa). Just pick a club where you can listen to your favorite music, buy a ticket and fun guaranteed. For those who prefer to spend that time in a more sophisticated way, the ideal solution is to attend a New Year's Eve ball (bal sylwestrowy). Specific outfit is sometimes required, often related to the theme of the ball (eg .: Latin music, 1950s, etc.). That also refers to the music you are going to dance to.
Lovers of classical music will definitely choose to go to a concert hall, where an evening outfit is required, and the party is of a calmer nature. Movie buffs decide to spend that evening at the cinema, where apart from watching some movies with their favourite actors and by their favourite directors they may also dance to film music.

Naturally, you should attend a bal in the first meaning of the word

TAKING IT EASY

If you would like to spend that time with your friends, don’t want to spend too much on tickets and worry about the outfits, domówka, i.e. a party thrown at someone’s house, is the best idea. Just invite some friends, turn good music on, make some tasty and preferrably Polish dishes (usually each guest brings something to eat) and you can party all night.
Regardless of where and how you party, at midnight (o północy) everyone makes a new year toast (toast), either with champagne (szampan), or sparkling wine (wino musujące), or ... your choice.
SZCZĘŚLIWEGO NOWEGO ROKU! /HAPPY NEW YEAR!

A FEW WORDS ON MIKOŁAJKI

POLISH MEMORIES OF ŚWIĘTY MIKOŁAJ (Saint Nicholas)

Gray November has finished. It is time for a truly winter month, which not only brings snow, but also always puts us in a holiday mood. Although there is still some time left until Christmas, it is hard not to notice all the Christmas decorations in the streets, shops, restaurants and shopping malls as well as hear the Christmas songs played everywhere. In Polish classes more and more often foreigners ask about Polish Christmas customs and traditions.
There is one night and one morning at the beginning of December that every Polish child, and adult as well, looks forward to. And that is Mikołajki (Saint Nicholas Day), which is a name day of every Mikołaj (Nicholas) and a time to celebrate the day of Święty Mikołaj (Saint Nicholas). Remembering the generosity and goodness of the bishop of Myra we give each other small gifts on the night between 5th and 6th December.

Check out our  FB page for more idioms and interesting facts about the Polish language.

 

 

 

IN THE SHOES AND UNDER THE PILLOW

The gifts may be left in two places: in the shoes (which have been cleaned and polished by the owner) standing beside the bed, or under the pillow. Not only children but also teenagers often wake up at night to check whether Saint Nicholas has visited the house and left some trifles. No one expects a lavish gift on that day, it would be hard to put it under a pillow or fit into children’s shoes anyway. Sweets, small toys and trifles that may be useful in everyday life or at school are common gifts (a Polish course may be an ideal gift for Mikołajki, check here for details ).
However, instead of a gift or lying right next to it under the pillow or in your shoe, you might find a rózga (twig). That is a sign that you should work on your behaviour and improve if you want to avoid a „gift disappointment“ at Christmas.

AT SCHOOL AND AT WORK (A CUSTOM NOT ONLY IN POLAND)

Another nice custom related to 6th December (check here to see how to write dates in Polish) is celebrating Mikołajki at school or work. Everything starts with drawing the name of a person we are going to get a gift for. Then we have some time to think of a proper gift and buy it (at school children often make the gifts themselves). Next we put the nicely wrapped gifts with name tags attached to them into one sack. The gifts are distributed in a friendly atmosphere and the receivers often wonder who their Mikołaj has been this year, since anonymity is the greatest thing about Mikołajki.

AUTUMN VOCABULARY DILEMAS IN POLISH

NAMES OF FRUIT DELICACIES IN POLISH

Beautiful Polish golden autumn (Indian summer) has started (check here to find out where this name came from) and trees change their colour from green into yellow, red and brown. This is a perfect time for walks or for courses of Polish as a foreign language (alright, there always a good time to learn Polish;-)). And of ocurse, it’s time to make some preserved fruit products (przetwory) , such as dżemy (jams), konfitury (preserves), powidła (plum jam)... And now! Here’s the question: What is the difference between dżem and konfitura? Are these words synonyms, or do they describe completely different sweet products made from fruit?

IN FACT THEY’RE NOT THE SAME

They are definitely not synonyms, and the multitude of names in Polish comes from the difference in their taste and ... the preparation process.
Dżem is the most popular of them, of course. You can find it on a shelf in every shop in Poland, different kinds. It’s made from fruit or its parts. It’s enough to add lots of sugar to it, preferrably the so-called ‘gelling sugar’, and boil it for a long time, stirring from time to time.
Marmolada is the easiest to make (in Polish marmolada – marmalade – is a product made from any kind of fruit, not only citrus fruit). Just add equal amount of sugar to the fruit (50% to 50%), grate it, boil it and then leave it to cool. You can spread it on a slice of bread and eat right away.
If you are a gourmet, however, and love the taste of fruit without any thickeners, you should go for konfitura. You need to select fruit to make it. Only the one that looks best and tasty will be used and added to the sugar syrup prepared beforehand. Konfitury (preserves) require more effort and attention, since you should try not to damage the fruit while stirring and need to keep an eye on the temperature as it should be neither too high nor too low. At the end of the process it’s a good idea to coat the edges of the jars with cognac :) .

No matter which you prefer, dżem or konfitura,
  you will find more interesting Polish vocabulary on our FB page.

POLISH DELICACY

Powidła (plum jam) is a real Rolls-Royce among the Polish preserved fruit products. This is a Polish speciality and it is made only from plums (the węgierka variety is the best choice, Eng. common plum). Adding sugar is not necessary. However, you need time, since it takes several days for powidła to be ready. After that we can enjoy the taste of pure fruit during winter evenings.
Now that you know all these words and the differences between them you can get down to work, or simply go to the shop and simply pick a jar with an appropriate name on it. Enjoy!

COMMUNICATION CONFUSION WITH KOMUNIKACJA

KOMUNIKACJA IN POLISH MEANS...

Today we’ll be talking about komunikacja, since this little word may easily confuse foreigners learning Polish.
Everything is fine as long as we are talking about komunikacja meaning the process of communicating, exchanging information or ideas. In this case the meaning of the word is crystal clear and even a beginner student of Polish does not see any difficulty or a catch here.

KOMUNIKACJA MEANING COMMUNICATION

There is komunikacja telefoniczna (telephone communication), mailowa (email) or internetowa (Internet), and listowna (through letters), which used to be popular in the past. We use  the word komunikacja with an adjective describing the means that enable information sharing and exchanging ideas. We can also use the preposition przez (through, by, over) and then we say kominukacja przez telefon, komunikatory, media społecznościowe (social media) or Internet. Remember that przez is followed by a noun in the accusative form.

WHAT LINKS KOMUNIKACJA AND TRANSPORT

However, the second meaning of the word causes surprise. Komunikacja in Polish also means movement consisting in maintaining the connection between two spots located within some distance from each other by various means of transport. There is komunikacja miejska (city/public transport), i.e. buses, trams, underground etc., podmiejska (suburban), connecting a city with its suburbs, międzymiastowa (intercity, literally: between cities) or międzynarodowa (international; from one country to another).  Therefore, a person who says they enjoy using komunikacja miejska on the way to work or their language course does not want to inform us about the ways of communicating with co-workers or classmates but to tell us that they get around by bus, tram or underground (Polish: jeździć autobusem, tramwajem, metrem; check here for conjugation of the verb jeździć).
And stała komunikacja między Warszawą a Poznaniem (regular connection between Warsaw and Poznań) means regular trains, for exmple, between these cities.
As you can see, good kominikacja always makes life easier.

More interesting facts on the Polish langauge and on komunikacja in Polish on our FB site.

A FEW WORDS ON POLISH PISANKI (Easter eggs)

WHAT DO WE CALL EASTER EGGS IN POLISH?

The period before and after Easter is the perfect time to talk about Polish Easter tradtions in your Polish classes.
If we think „Easter“ we mustn’t forget coloured eggs called pisanki in Polish. They appear in Polish homes together with catkins (bazie, aka kotki, literally kittens, because they remind us of these fluffy animals), first spring flowers, garden cress (rzeżucha) and figures of bunnies (zajączki), chickens (kurczaczki) and a lamb (baranek). Traditionally, they are symbols of new life.

However, not everyone knows (it may be interesting for both foreigners and Polish native speakers) that the coloured eggs have different names depending on the technique used to make them.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN „PISANKA” AND „KRASZANKA”

Pisanki were initially eggs on which the patterns were painted (pisane) with hot wax and which where next put into a homemade dye. Nowadays this name is used to talk about coloured Easter eggs in general.
The single coloured eggs are called kraszanki. Traditionally, natural dyes were used to colour them, such as onion skins to get red or bark of young apple trees to get golden colour.
You need to put a lot of effort into making a drapanka, which is made by scraping patterns in the soft layer of the egg shell. Oklejanki are eggs that have been covered with (oklejone) coloured pieces of fabric or yarn. The most challenging and time-consuming, however, are ażurki, which at first glance seem to be made of lace but are actually made from empty egg shells in which fine patterns are cut out.

This is a drapanka of course :) Check out our FB profile for more information on Easter traditions and the Polish language

No matter what name we call Easter eggs, they are beautiful items decorating Easter tables not only in Poland.

THE WINTER CAPITAL OF POLAND

WINTERTIME MADNESS

Summer is not the only time that encourages people to take some time off work and relax, or attend an intensive course of the Polish language. As we all know, any time of the year is good enough to learn a language, regardless of the season.
When winter comes, it’s time for białe szaleństwo (witness madness), which means ferie or urlop na nartach (skiing holidays), and if you don’t know what the difference between ferie and urlop is, please check out the previous blog entry.
You might go skiing in the Alps, or in one of the skiing resorts of Poland.

                      Check out our FB profile for more exercises on Polish, or to see photos from all over Poland

SKI MECCA 

Zakopane, a town located 85 km south of Cracow, has long been and will probably long remain the ski Mecca for both Polish and foreign skiers. It has been called the winter capital of Poland for a long time. Once you’re there, you’ll understand what it owes its name to. Besides being one of the largest winter sports resort in the country, it’s also beautifully  located, thanks to which you can admire the mightiness of the mountains.
In Zakopane there are routes for advanced skiers and for those, who have just started their skiing adventure. If you haven’t tried skiing before, you can get ski lessons given by experienced instructors.
Even if you don’t ski, you should definitely take the cable car to the top of Kasprowy Wierch (1987m above sea level) to enjoy the panoramic view of the Tatra Mountains.
You will experience amazing emotions while watching the Ski Jumping World Cup. At the end of January Zakopane hosts fans of ski jumping. They go there to cheer the skiers on in the competition that is held on Wielka Krokiew, which is the largest ski jump in Poland.

GRZANIEC IN KRUPÓWKI

When you feel tired from sports emotions, skiing, snow and cold, we recommend going for a walk along Krupówki, the most representative street of Zakopane. While there you must try grzaniec (mulled wine, hot wine with spices and honey), or góralska herbata z prądem (literally: highland tea with electricity, which is tea with alcohol). Try the traditional dishes of Podhale cuisine, which are known and liked by people from all over Poland. Finally, go to the Tatra Museum to get to know the art and culture of the inhabitants of Podhale, which has long fascinated not only the Poles, but also foreigners who come here.
While in Zakopane you are bound to hear the dialect used by the native inhabitants of the region. Besides the dialect, they also speak Polish very well, so you’ll be able to practise your Polish and the declension: jestem w Zakopanem, przyjechaliśmy do Zakopanego, or Zakopanemu trudno się oprzeć, jest takie piękne - Zakopane is so beautiful that you can’t resist it (more on Polish grammar you can learn in courses of Polish for foreigners).

CHRISTMAS IN TRADITIONAL POLISH STYLE

POLISH CHRISTMAS CELEBRATION 

Christmas is a time everyone always looks forward to and anticipates. And Christmas celebrated in „Polish style“ is shrouded in myth and legend among foreigners. There are stories of tables groaning with food, multi-generational family reunions and beautiful Polish Christmas carols sung by whole families. It is not surprising, since Polish Christmas celebration traditions are not only rich, but also simply beautiful.

SPARE PLATE ON POLISH TABLE

In Poland the celebration begins with the Christmas Eve supper (kolacja wigilijna). It’s a time of joyful anticipation. Everything must be very well prepared and, as the Polish nicely put it, „zapięte na ostatni guzik“ (buttoned up).
First, we decorate the Christmas tree, then we lay the table. We often put a bundle of hay under the white tablecoth, which is a reminder of a manger where Jesus was born. There is always one place-setting more than there are guests who will be sitting at the table. The spare plate is meant for a „weary wanderer“, a traveller who might knock on the door on that night. The Polish tradition refers to the search for a place to spend the night by Mary and Joseph and says that on the Christmas Eve night everyone should let in an unexpected guest if one stands at their door.

                                                    What do you call a Christmas tree in Polish?

                                                         Other riddles refering to the Polish language you can find here

TWELVE DISHES FOR THE CHIRSTMAS EVE SUPPER

Nowadays, you can find twelve dishes (the number refers to twelve apostles and twelve months), but it wasn’t always like that. In the old days nine dishes were served at mansions of nobility and eleven at mansions of magnates. The odd number was believed to bring prosperity and abundance to the household in the upcoming year. The dishes served on Christmas Eve vary from region to region, however, they should always contain all the fruits of the earth, coming from the fields, woods, gardens and water. Therefore, traditional dishes are made with poppy seeds, grains of cereals, cabbage, mushrooms, honey, fruit and fish. Poppy seeds and cereals would provide wealth and offspring, fish would provide health, cabbage would give people strengh and vitality, mushrooms – prosperity and good fortune, honey – well-being and long life, and fruit – love and harmony. If you have a lesson on Christmas in your Polish class, you’ll find out that there’s no Christmas without barszcz z uszkami (beetroot soup with ravioli), pierogi z kapustą i grzybami (dumplings filled with cabbage and cooked dried mushrooms), śledź (herring), karp (carp), or kompot z suszonych owoców (dried fruit compote). There must be makowiec (poppy seed cake), piernik (gingerbread), babka drożdżowa (yeast cake) and kutia (sweet grain pudding).
The Christmas Eve supper doesn’t begin until the appearance of the first star in the sky. Before we sit at the table and start feasting we share opłatek (wafer) and wish each other good fortune and happiness, since Christmas is a time of forgiving and reconciling.

WHO BRINGS POLISH CHILDREN GIFTS?

After the supper many Poles sing Christmas carols. That is also a moment when Święty Mikołaj (Saint Nicolas), Gwiazdor (in Wielkopolska, Kujawy, Kaszuby and Western Pomerania), Aniołek (in Małopolska), or Dzieciątko Jezus (Child Jesus, as they call him in Upper Silesia) bring gifts.
At midnight whole families attend Pasterka, the Midnight Mass at the local church, which takes its name after pasterze (shepherds), who were the first ones to welcome the newly born Jesus. That is the night when everyone enjoys the beginning of Christmas.

                      You’ll learn in our courses of Polish for foreigners how to wish someone a Merry Christmas 

I’D LIKE A KILO OF APPLES (POPROSZĘ KILO JABŁEK), OR SHOPPING IN POLISH

A FEW PHRASES AND NUMBERS

It would seem that doing the shopping is more or less the same wherever in the world we are. It’s enough to learn the names of several products, numbers and some practical phrases in a language, e.g. Polish, and you’re ready to go to the shops. Naturally, you can always “take the easy way out” and go to a supermarket. However, even before going there it’s a good idea to look up the names of departments, because the Polish piekarnia sounds nothing like the German “Backerei”, English “bakery” or Spanish “panderia”. Apart from piekarnia you might need words like pieczywo(bread and bread-like goods), nabiał (dairy products) or chemia gospodarcza (household chemicals). Having learned those words you won’t be confused once in a shop, and it’ll spare you the unnecessary run around the shop in search of one product.

KILO MEANS KILOGRAM

However, if you decide to go to a corner shop, you should do your homework and go over the „weight“ topic. Obviously, the official unit of mass in Poland is a kilogram, whose prototype is in Sevres, France. The question is, how it works in the Polish language. It is generally known that users of every language have habits of their own.
First of all, all Polish shoppers use the short form of the word kilogram. Therefore, a Pole buys 2 kilos (dwa kilo), not 2 kilograms, of apples, potatoes or plums at the market. For the same reason you should ask for pół kilo (half a kilo – 500 grams) of cheese.

BETWEEN GRAMS AND DEKAGRAMS

We hardly ever buy half a kilo of ham, though, unless we are throwing a big party. When we feel like a sandwich with ham we should ask for (attention!) 15 dekagrams (15 deka) of it. And here’s when many foreigners ask themselves: „What is DEKA?“. The answer is simple, it’s short for „dekagram“ (=100 grams). The Polish use dekagrams, not grams. That’s why when in a shop we ask for 20 deka, not 200 grams of cheese. Shop assistants will definitely understand if the customer says: Poproszę 250 gramów tych pysznych ciastek (I’d like 250 grams of those delicious biscuits), but it does sound a bit unnatural.

                                    In Polish we ask for „20 deka“ of cheese rahther than „200 gramów“

You will definitely learn about this habit in classes of Polish for foreigners (see here for more information on courses). If you’re not sure of something, ask your teacher, one of your Polish colleagues, check out our facebook profile, or remember to read our blog regularly.

HOW TO PREPARE A GOOD LESSON OF POLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE? PART 2.

A GOOD POLISH LESSON. WHAT SHOULD IT BE LIKE?

100% (or almost 100%) IN POLISH!
Speak Polish! Kind of obvious, but... If you speak English or any other language for most of the lesson, it’s YOU who practises their language skills, not your students. There’s a common misconception about teaching Polish: when teaching a group of beginners it isn’t possible to use Polish only, especially during the first few lessons. Well, it IS possible! Obviously, you need to simplify the language register a lot, use your body language and visual aids, and first of all, you need to adapt the material to the specific moment of the course or lesson. Clearly, you are not going to start the first class (beginner course) with the past tense, but with introductions and alphabet, and the phrase „Co słychać?“ (How’s it going?) you’re likely to introduce at the beginning rather than the end of the lesson.

THE STRUCTURE OF A LESSON
Remember about the structure of your lesson. No matter how long the Polish lesson is, your student should go through the following stages: warm-up – review of the last lesson – introduction of new material – drilling new material – student’s performance – summary. Remember about the margin of error for your students, do not correct every single mistake that lower level students make. The less advanced the student, the larger the margin of error is acceptable.
When introducing grammar, remember: first an example, which you analyse, and then the rule (never the other way round). For homework your students can practise grammar in a fun way: application Polish for Foreigners (available also on iOS, iPAD and Windows).
Better to do less but properly, than more but just whiz through it. If you provide students with too much material during a lesson, they won’t memorize it all anyway.

YOUR STUDENTS
Listen to your students, pay attention to their verbal and non-verbal signals, find out what they’re interested in, ask them questions (without invading their privacy) and remember that being a Polish teacher you often meet people of different cultural background, confession or having values different from yours. Respect that!

                                     

One of the pictures you can find on our facebook page PoPolskuPFP. What grammatical problem does it help to explain?

HOW TO PREPARE A GOOD LESSON OF POLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE? PART 1.

A GOOD POLISH LESSON. WHAT SHOULD IT BE LIKE?

WHO IS YOUR STUDENT?
First of all, you need to figure out WHO the lesson is FOR. Who’s the foreigner you’re going to teach? Is it a businessperson who has no time to do the homework and wants to make full use of the lesson time, because that’s the only time when they can learn the language? Or is it a new mom who needs Polish to communicate with the doctor, do the shopping or to answer some question while in the park? Or maybe a student who is going to start attending university courses and needs to learn Polish as quickly as possible? Or is your student a keen language learner and the Polish course is simply another one of many in his life? Such a student is bound to ask you plenty of questions with the same level of enthusiasm as the fans of cars of sport when talking about their passions. If you love your job, a course like that will give you a lot of satisfaction.

GROUP COURSES
When conducting classes in groups, you should first try to figure out what the average level of the group is as soon as possible. That means that the pace, rhythm and your expectations as a teacher should be adjusted not to the weakest or the most gifted student but to the one between, the average one. The common mistake many teachers make, and we mean teachers in general, not only teachers of Polish as a foreign language, is that their lessons are „based“ either on the most gifted student (it’s easier for US to work like that, but is it the best solution for the group?), or they focus on the weakest student too much, trying to help him or her. Remember to note whether there are native speakers of any Slavic languages in the group. And if such students have been put in the same group as non-Slavic speakers learning Polish, that proves that the school running the course lacks professionalism. The differences between Slavic and non-Slavic students will be discussed in another entry.

COURSEBOOKS
You should be SELECTIVE about coursebooks available on the market. Believe me, most foreigners aren’t interested in lessons in which they’re asked to describe their flat, talk about fortune-telling and divination or analyse Polish legends. Do not torture foreigners by making them read Polish classics! Do not talk about the opera with a student who is a financial analyst and prefers golf; do not make an engineer read a text on classical music when he or she likes dark rock, and do not teach a mom who has decided to be a homemaker how to find a job in Poland. Obviously, that’s not the case when you are teaching a course preparing for a Polish language certificate exam. Then you need to go over the topics which are less practical for a student in everyday life.

MATERIALS FOR LEARNING POLISH
See that you use wide range of materials. If you use coursebooks available on the market on a regular basis, be sure to check whether the texts published there are up-to-date. Do not be afraid to use material from the press, radio or the Internet, especially when teaching advanced students. Make sure that the Polish language you teach is the „living language“, currently spoken by native speakers. Invite your students to like facebook pages which will support their learning: PoPolskuPFP , use materials available online, e.g. sites with conjugation of Polish verbs, suggest that your students become acquainted with applications, such as  Polish for Foreigners, which will provide them with additional exercises and practice.

WHY LEARN POLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE?

REASONS FOR CHOOSING TO LEARN POLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE

Why should foreigners learn Polish?

That’s the question many foreigners probably ask themselves after the first Polish lesson, which usually gives them an impression that Polish is difficult. The first answer that comes to one’s mind is that there are about 44 million speakers of Polish around the world. That means there are 44 million chances of you meeting a Polish speaking person somewhere in the world.

However, there are more practical reasons. Imagine foreigners who have arrived in Warsaw, for instance. Just in case they type in the keywords „Polish for foreigners Warsaw“ in the browser (or they can simply go to Po Polsku site and find all the necessary and important information on courses of Polish as a foreign language in Warsaw) and start wondering whether to learn Polish.

Polish is useful!

Obviously, at work or at a restaurant they can communicate in English with not much of a problem. However, assuming that the students take an active part in the lesson, after only one class they will be able to read the name of the street where they live or work without much difficulty.
They will be able to tell a taxi driver their address, no matter whether the street is called Świętokrzyska, Szczera or Pajęcza (these are some examples from Warsaw).
After the next few lessons of the course the foreigners will easily find bread at a supermarket. They will know they they can find it under the letter „P”, which is the first letter of the word „pieczywo”(the name of the department in a store) or „piekarnia”, and not under the letter „B” like „bakery”. It seems a mere trifle, but it definitely makes life easier and helps us save time, which is, as we know, precious.
On the way back from the shop you can listen to the radio, which makes driving more enjoyable. And the radio, as we all know, is not only music, but the news as well, which is always worth listening to. After the course of Polish for foreigners you shouldn’t have difficulty understanding what you hear.
As you can see, Polish is definitely worth learning, you’ll find it useful in everyday situations, it’ll make your life more enjoyable, you’ll be able to listen to the radio, read papers and good books in original version and first of all, you’ll be able to tell your neighbour in the morning „Dzień dobry! Co u pana słychać?” (Good morning, how are you?)