The Fastest Way to Learn Hindi Grammar

The Unlocked method of learning grammar relies heavily on grammar drills. I would argue that if you really want to learn Hindi grammar fast and master it there isn’t a better way to do it then by drilling. Drills are exercise, they are the warm-up before the game and for that reason it’s easy to neglect them. But they are the fastest way to learn Hindi grammar by far. They build skill and confidence so that you can go out into the real world of Hindi conversations and know that you are speaking correctly. Therefore in this post I’ll explain why drills are so important an how to do them.

Learn Hindi Grammar Fast with Drills

You should spend a good portion of your Hindi language learning time drilling. This will help you learn Hindi Grammar fast. Most grammar books walk you through different lessons which might teach different grammar rules. You practice by answering some questions or filling in the blanks before moving on to the next lesson. But come on… you know you haven’t really ‘learned’ or ‘mastered’ that grammatical rule. And secondly, with this approach you may not be integrating previous knowledge with the new knowledge you are picking up. Drills help you to integrate previous grammar ‘keys’ with new ones which in turn speeds up your mastery of the language.

“If you really want to learn Hindi grammar fast and master it there isn’t a better way to do it then by drilling.”

Types of Hindi Grammar Drills

There are a few different ways to do drills. And you should use all of them because the more you mix up your drills the more comfortable and confident you will become in your Hindi speaking.

Learn Hindi Grammar Quickly with Single Drills

You can start with single drills. Single drills are just drilling one thing the same way each time. You may be changing the vocabulary but you are drilling the same grammatical construction. An example of this is:

Haan, main sabzee khaa-taa hun (Yes, I eat vegetables)
Haan, main rotee khaa-tee hun (Yes, I eat bread)
Etc

Single drills are good to make sure we get the initial grasp of the grammar key but they can mislead us into thinking we have learned something because we are just repeating the same key again and again in a drilling environment but we may not be able to reproduce that phrase on demand in conversation.

Strengthen Hindi Learning with Isolation Drills

Isolation drills involve flipping back and forth between two grammatical constructions. This helps us to highlight both the commonalities and the differences between the two constructions and as a result both are strengthened. An example of a isolation drill is:

Haan, main rotee khaa-taa hun (Yes I eat bread)
Nahin, main rotee nahin khaa-taa hun (No, I do not eat bread)

Note that isolation drills don’t have to be opposites. You could also flip back and forth between masculine and feminine endings or between anything else. But you are isolating one grammatical feature changing it.
 

Prepare Yourself to Speak Hindi in no time with Conversation Drills

Conversation drills are powerful because they best emulate natural speech. You are doing what you want to learn how to do, namely speak Hindi. They follow the flow of a natural conversation so you won’t be repeating a grammatical key over and over again. Instead you will be using a variety of grammatical keys to build a conversation. It might look something like this:

Do you eat bread?
No, I don’t eat bread
What do you eat?
I eat rice.

Master Hindi with Mixed Grammar Drills

Mixed drills are extremely powerful and versatile and they test your grammatical muscles to the max. You cycle through totally different grammatical constructions to reinforce what you have learned. Think of it as rubbing your belly and patting your head at the same time! You can almost feel your brain stretch. When you can do mixed drills you know that you have mastered those grammatical constructs. Mixed drills can be built by combining several isolation exercises together or by mutating a given sentence into every possible form you can think of e.g. making it a question, putting it in the negative, converting it to every other tense and gender you can. A mixed drill might look like this:

I eat bread
I don’t eat bread
You eat bread
You don’t eat bread
Do you eat bread?
What do you eat?

Mixed drills also might entail using totally dissimilar grammatical constructions so you don’t just repeat the pattern (as with single drills) and you force your mind to remember the different rules. An example of this is

Conclusion

Drills are powerful tools for rapidly turning grammar knowledge into Hindi grammar skill and speaking ability. You can create drills yourself by trying to create every possible combination of phrases you can from grammar rules and vocabulary you are familiar with. Then switch between different drill methods to strengthen your grasp of the Hindi language even further. 

Finally I want to tell you that creating drill templates can take time and it might be hard to know where to begin if you are just starting your Hindi learning journey. The good news is with our grammar courses we take care of all of that for you. Our Beginner Hindi Grammar Course comes with downloadable PDF drill sheets for you to start practicing right away. So check it out now and happy drilling!