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A2 Speaking Teil 3: 5 Phrases That Pass Any “Plan It Together” Task

GetGermanReady••6 min readA2SpeakingExam tips

There's a moment in the A2 speaking exam that freezes a lot of otherwise well-prepared people. Your partner and the examiner are sitting across from you, and the task card says something like „Planen Sie gemeinsam einen Ausflug.“ — Plan a trip together. Suddenly you're not thinking about German at all; you're thinking “I don't know anything about planning a trip.” And that's the trap — because the exam was never asking you to be a good trip-planner.

This part is officially „Gemeinsam etwas planen“ — plan something together — and a collaborative planning task like it appears in Sprechen Teil 3 of both the Goethe and telc A2 exams (telc also frames it as „etwas aushandeln“). It's a short dialogue: you and your partner get a small task (organise a party, buy a gift, plan a day out) and a few picture or word prompts, and you talk it through until you agree on a plan.

The thing nobody tells you
The examiner is not grading your plan. They're grading whether you can make a suggestion, react to your partner's suggestion, and reach an agreement. Master those three moves and the topic barely matters.

That's great news, because it means you can prepare language, not content. You don't need ideas about parties or trips — you need a handful of phrases you can drop into any planning conversation. Here are the five that carry the whole task.

The 5 phrases

  1. Suggest — „Ich schlage vor, dass wir …“ — I suggest that we … (e.g. „Ich schlage vor, dass wir uns um drei Uhr treffen.“)
  2. Ask back — „Was meinst du?“ — What do you think? (hands the turn to your partner — the examiner loves this)
  3. Agree — „Gute Idee! Einverstanden.“ — Good idea! Agreed.
  4. Say no + counter — „Lieber nicht. Wie wäre es mit …?“ — Rather not. How about …? (e.g. „Wie wäre es mit einem Café?“)
  5. Seal it — „Also gut, abgemacht!“ — Alright, deal!
Why these five and not others
A planning dialogue is just a loop: propose → react → agree or counter → confirm. These five phrases cover every position in that loop. Whatever the topic throws at you, you're always somewhere in this cycle — so you always have a line ready.

The word behind the task: der Vorschlag

derder Vorschlag
vor — fore- / forward+Schlag — a strike / hit (from schlagen, to strike)
literally a “strike forward”→a proposal / suggestion — what you “put forward.” The matching verb splits: „Ich schlage einen Ausflug vor.“ (vorschlagen → schlage … vor).

Notice the verb vorschlagen is separable: the vor- jumps to the end of the sentence — „Ich schlage einen Kaffee vor.“ But in the safe template „Ich schlage vor, dass wir …“ the dass clause does the heavy lifting, and the verb of your idea goes to the very end: „… dass wir uns treffen.“ That word-order rule (verb last after dass) is the one thing to drill.

A worked mini-dialogue

Task: „Ein Kollege verlässt die Firma. Planen Sie gemeinsam ein Abschiedsgeschenk.“ — A colleague is leaving; plan a goodbye gift together. Watch how the two speakers just cycle through the five moves:

  • A (suggest): „Ich schlage vor, dass wir ein Buch kaufen. Was meinst du?“ — I suggest we buy a book. What do you think?
  • B (say no + counter): „Lieber nicht. Wie wäre es mit einem Gutschein?“ — Rather not. How about a voucher?
  • A (agree): „Gute Idee! Einverstanden. Und eine Karte für alle zum Unterschreiben?“ — Good idea! Agreed. And a card for everyone to sign?
  • B (agree + seal): „Ja, perfekt. Also gut, abgemacht!“ — Yes, perfect. Alright, deal!

Four short turns and the task is complete. Neither speaker said anything clever about gifts — they just proposed, reacted, agreed, and confirmed. That's a passing performance.

Common mistakes that cost points

  • Only saying „Ja.“ — Agreeing with a bare ja and going silent kills the dialogue. The examiner needs to hear you react and build: „Gute Idee! Und …?“
  • Never handing over the turn. If you plan the whole thing alone, it's a monologue, not a dialogue. Drop in „Was meinst du?“ to pull your partner in — it shows interaction.
  • Agreeing with everything. A little disagreement is good German! „Lieber nicht, wie wäre es mit …?“ shows more range than nodding along to every idea.
  • Wrong case after mit. Wie wäre es mit …? takes the dative: „mit einem Kaffee“ (der Kaffee → dem/einem), „mit einer* Karte“ (die Karte → der/einer).
  • Forgetting verb-last after dass. „Ich schlage vor, dass wir ein Buch kaufen*.“ — the verb goes to the end, not „dass wir kaufen ein Buch.“
Your partner says: „Ich schlage vor, dass wir ins Kino gehen.“ You'd rather not — counter with a café.
„Lieber nicht. Wie wäre es mit einem Café?“ (mit + dative → einem Café). Then hand it back: „Was meinst du?“
Finish the suggestion with correct word order: „Ich schlage vor, dass wir uns um sechs …“ (treffen)
„… dass wir uns um sechs treffen.“ After dass, the verb goes to the very end.

The takeaway

A2 Sprechen Teil 3 isn't a creativity test — it's a conversation-management test. The examiner wants to see you suggest, react, disagree politely, and agree. Carry these five phrases in your pocket and no planning prompt can catch you off guard: whatever the topic, you're always just one move in the loop away from your next line.

The only way they become automatic is to say them out loud until they're a reflex. You can practise speaking German aloud — with instant feedback on a real planning task — right here: