The exercise itself is in German; the explanation pages it links to are in Turkish.

A2.2 · Präteritum

Präteritum: sein, haben, Modalverben (simple past)

When talking about what happened in the past, sein, haben and the modal verbs are usually used in the Präteritum (simple past); these forms are irregular. You will work out the correct forms yourself in the exercise. All exercise content is in German.

Recognise: match the person and the infinitive with the Präteritum form.

Matched: 0 / 10
Person · Verb
Präteritum
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A2 · PRAETERITUM SEIN HABEN MODAL
A2 Präteritum Exercises: sein, haben and Modal Verbs

The Präteritum is the written past tense of German, but sein, haben and the modal verbs are also used very often in everyday speech instead of the Perfekt. These verbs have irregular forms: sein → war, haben → hatte; the modal verbs have no umlaut in the Präteritum: können → konnte, müssen → musste, wollen → wollte, dürfen → durfte, sollen → sollte. For example "Ich war gestern krank und hatte keine Zeit" (I was ill yesterday and had no time) or "Als Kind konnte ich nicht schwimmen, aber ich wollte es lernen" (As a child I couldn't swim, but I wanted to learn). The "du" form is regular too: du warst, du hattest, du musstest.

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Golden rule: When talking about the past, these three prefer the Präteritum to the Perfekt: "war" (sein), "hatte" (haben), and for the modals "konnte, musste, wollte".

What scares people most about the Präteritum of modal verbs is that the umlauts disappear: "können" becomes "konnte", "müssen" becomes "musste". You also need to keep "war" and "hatte" apart. Because you see the correct form and the reason for it whenever you enter a form in the exercise, you leave the "konnte or musste" hesitation behind by trying again and again. These structures are useful in almost every sentence about the past: when you talk about your childhood or sum up your day yesterday. They also matter for anyone preparing for the Goethe-Zertifikat A2 and telc A2, because in texts that tell a story or describe the past, war/hatte and the modal verbs should be a reflex. The more you repeat them, the more comfortably you use the past tense.

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Quick answer

What is in the "Präteritum: sein, haben, Modalverben" exercise?

The "Präteritum: sein, haben, Modalverben" exercise is at level A2 and has 5 steps with 50 questions in total: 10 matching items, 30 multiple-choice questions and 10 gap-fill items.

The steps in order: Match · Formen · Transform · Richtig/Falsch · Write.

You get instant feedback after every answer; the exercise runs in your browser, is free and needs no sign-up or installation.

Where can I study "Präteritum: sein, haben, Modalverben"?

The explanation for this exercise is on the page German Past Tenses (Perfekt, Präteritum, Plusquamperfekt) (in Turkish). Read the rule there, then reinforce it with the 50 questions on this page.