Welcome to this deck on the German passive voice, also known as the Vorgangspassiv. In English, we use the passive voice to focus on an action or the result of an action, rather than on the person or thing doing it. For example, instead of saying 'Someone stole my bike', we might say 'My bike was stolen'. German uses the passive voice in a similar way, and in this deck, you'll learn how to form it in three key tenses: the present, the simple past, and the perfect tense.

The German passive voice is formed with two main ingredients. First, you need a helper verb, or auxiliary verb. Second, you need the main verb of the action, but in a specific form. Let's look at these two parts now.

Excellent. To form the passive in the present tense, or Präsens, you conjugate the verb 'werden' to match the subject, and then you add the past participle of the main verb at the end of the sentence. For example, the active sentence 'Der Mann liest das Buch' meaning 'The man reads the book', becomes 'Das Buch wird gelesen', which means 'The book is being read'.