From start to Finnish is one of the few books available meant especially for self-study. It’s written in English, which makes it different from most other course books which are completely in Finnish. This book was first released in 1998, but they’re up to the 13th edition now, with the newest version published in 2017.

The book does a pretty good job explaining what makes Finnish different. It has short chapters that each cover one specific limited topic, which makes it quite manageable. However, you will definitely need other sources in addition to this book, because what’s included won’t be enough to get a hang of the topics. Each chapter has a couple of short dialogues that simply demonstrate the grammar topic covered in that chapter. As such, you would really benefit from another book with longer, more authentic dialogues or texts.

The grammar topics covered are the same ones you will find in other A1-A2 course books. This includes the verbtypes, imperfect and perfect tense, the imperative, the conditional as well as the most common cases (partitive, genitive, location cases). This book does not give you much vocabulary, which is another reason to combine it with a different book if you decide to use it. With the aid of only this book, you will be able to make short sentences, but it doesn’t include any topics in detail as other beginner course books usually do. There are no vocabulary lists included related to e.g. body parts, clothing or food vocabulary.

You will also need to find a source for exercises about the topics presented. This book mainly contains translation exercises. The solutions are included at the back of the book.

The book Kato hei focuses on teaching spoken language and has recently been renewed completely. You’re likely to find the older version (with a blue cover rather than a bright yellow one) in Finnish libraries still. The newest version has more – and more natural – conversations and the vocabulary has been updated. The new Kato hei has, for example, examples that talk about smart phones, emails and bad internet connections. In addition, they have also added exercises in the latest version, though there are fairly few of these.

Kato hei starts from the very basics and mainly contains written dialogues in spoken language. It’s written completely in Finnish. The book is of course accompanied by recordings of all the dialogues included in it. There are two versions of the recordings. The limited version is cheaper but only contains the dialogues of the book. The full version also includes the book’s listening exercises.

Contrary to what you might think, this book is not solely meant to learn spoken language. It gradually introduces you to new grammar topics and phrases just as any other textbook would. Each chapter starts with an overview of a grammar topic. Topics discussed in Kato hei cover levels A1 and A2 (e.g. the verbtypes and the past tense, the partitive case, necessity sentences, the passive and the conditional). It includes some more advanced topics as well (e.g. plural partitive, plural genitive and plural illative). The grammar is always followed by multiple colloquial dialogues in which these forms are used. The chapters in this book are not organized by vocabulary theme. Rather, each chapter contains mini dialogues that cover different topics. The difficulty level of the dialogues increases as you get further in the book.

Each chapter in the newest version of Kato hei also has exercises. These include reading comprehension exercises based on the dialogues, grammar exercises, “translation” exercises from spoken to written, and listening exercises. After that, each chapter comes with a word list of spoken/written new words. Last but not least, each chapter has some spoken language explanations of spoken language phrases, words or forms. The last part of the book comes with a valuable overview of the different aspects of the phonology, morphology, syntax and vocabulary of spoken language.

The book claims to be good for both self-study and as a course book. If you’re going to use it for self-study, I would recommend that you first get to at least level A1.3, so you can understand the explanations, since this book is completely in Finnish. Whether you consider this book suitable for self-study depends on whether you feel capable of using a book where only one language is used. The advanced texts at the very end of the book might give you problems even at level A2.

This book includes spoken language from the very beginning, but I wouldn’t say it’s a spoken language textbook in the same way as Kato hei. In Sun suomi spoken language is included as a natural element of the Finnish language, alongside written Finnish.

Based on the usage of English, you might deduce that it’s a good book for self-study. Some of the exercise types contradict this conclusion: each chapter has at least a couple pair or group assignments. The fact that the solutions to the exercises are available separately in the teacher’s guide also leads to the same conclusion. Nothing stops you from buying the Teacher’s guide though!

The grammar in Sun suomi is explained in English. It starts from the very beginning with things such as vowel harmony and the genitive. Included are all the typical A1 and A2 grammar topics, such as the partitive, the verbtypes, the imperative, the location cases, the T-plural and infinitive verb rections.The very back of the book has an overview of the grammar in the book.

The vocabulary themes in Sun suomi are also centered around the typical A1-A2 topics such as telling the time, talking about the weather, food, clothes, as well as vocabulary for interactions in a restaurant, hotel, or train station. The book contains sections where it also gives you information about Finnish culture, such as how to behave in a restaurant, how to answer the phone and what types of homes are popular in Finland. Some functional reading texts have also made it into the book: you can find, for example, some ads for hotels, instructions on a coffee machine, notes on a notice board and housing advertisements.

The exercises included often require you to deduce some vocabulary or grammar from the reading texts. There are typical fill-in-the-gap exercises for both vocabulary and grammar, but also prompts to write or talk about your own life using the vocabulary provided. Each chapter has some exercises that you’re supposed to do in the classroom setting as well as a couple of listening exercises. If you buy the book from Adlibris or Booky, the CD is included in the price.

The book Suomi selväksi is meant for Estonians, which means that the vocabulary gets introduced in a fairly strange order sometimes. This is probably because the assumption is that Estonians will pick up a lot just by knowing the similar words in their language.

What makes this book so awesome for every Finnish language learner (not just Estonians) are the clear grammar explanations. The book is filled with simple tables that help you understand the grammar. If you’re just looking for a book to go over some confusing grammar in a clear way, this book is bound to help. A couple of explanations rely on you being able to compare Estonian and Finnish grammar to one another.

However, a beginner learner who doesn’t speak Estonian runs the risk of confusing which parts are written in Finnish and which in Estonian. This means the book is definitely not suitable for non-Estonian beginners. This book has surprisingly little Estonian in it, but that doesn’t make the risk of confusing the languages much smaller. I would recommend this book to students at about A2.1 level that want to look over the grammar while simultaneously studying in a Finnish language course or something.

The book contains reading texts (dialogues and narratives, some pretty long, but good quality), word lists (translations to Estonian), excellent grammar explanations and overview tables, exercises (solutions not included) and conversation topic suggestions.

A lot of grammar is included in this book. It covers most of the Finnish cases (even the instructive and plural genitive, partitive and location cases near the end of the book) and most of the verb forms (present, imperfect, passive, conditional, participles, fourth infinitive, etc.). The vocabulary topics are typical A1-A2 topics, such as telling the time, describing clothes, body parts, hobbies, illnesses and the weather.

Forget the book and just watch the videos! Back in 2005 when I started my first Finnish course, the book Supisuomea was all the rage. While it wasn’t appropriate for self-study at all (too chaotic, all in Finnish, not systematic, nearly no exercises), it was (for lack of a better book) used in Finnish courses. The one redeeming feature of the book was the accompanying videos.

The book itself is no longer in print, though you might be able to find it in Finnish libraries. The videos, however, have stood the test of time. They’re still available on yle’s website. While they have their drawbacks (unnatural dialogues, stiff language, bad acting), they’re nice to just watch and pick up some of the grammar with. The videos also include a lot of cultural information about Finland.

The grammar in this book is explained in tables, which are pretty hard to grasp just based on the book, but nice in combination with the videos. Grammar topics covered are the typical A1-A2 grammar topics, such as partitive, genitive, location cases, imperative, imperfect, third infinitive, passive, comparative, etc. The topics discussed in the book and video series are all practical things an immigrant might need, with lots of cultural information about Finland included. You learn how to buy food at a market, buy tickets at the train station, what to say at the doctor‘s or pharmacy, how to talk about the weather and much more.

This book seems very suitable for slower paced Finnish courses. For self-study, it might just be a nice book to take with you to a beginner Finnish course and read when you finish an exercise and have to wait for the group. It’s a very pleasant book to leaf through, with both colorful drawings and pictures, a large font and plenty of empty space.

As a plain self-study book, I don’t think it’s as useful due to the lack of exercises. The exercises included are almost always the kind where you need to discuss things with a classmate (e.g. asking for the time, giving directions, talking about your favorite foods). There are no example solutions available.

The book mainly contains dialogues and short narratives describing everyday situations. In addition, you can find some strongly simplified “real life” texts, such as advertisements, recipes and messages. Topics covered in the book include greetings, the days of the week, telling the time, basic professions, talking about foods, furniture and visiting the doctor. The main focus is always on using language in order to communicate with others. None of the dialogues have any spoken language in them, but there is a two-page section near the end of the book where spoken language is used in emails.

The grammar included in Helppoa suomea are typical A1 level topics such as minulla on -sentences, the verbtypes, the partitive, the location cases, some basic postpositions and täytyy-sentences. These topics are displayed in sections where you mainly just get some examples. The back of the book contains some additional grammar explanations. Grammar is never the main focus of the book, so it’s never explained in great detail. It is interesting how this book for beginners has a small section with a very simplified explanation about the plural partitive.

The difficulty level of the reading texts jumps back and forth. This is another reason that I wouldn’t recommend using this book as your main source for self-study. The audio of the book can be streamed for free online.

If you’re a health professional (nurse, dentist, doctor) and just starting out with learning Finnish, the approach of this book might interest you! Throughout the whole book, every topic discussed is related to health in some way. This might be a nice way to ease into learning Finnish while also learning things related to your profession. The fact that each chapter is related to health care doesn’t mean that this book is completely unsuitable for other learners.

The book Hoidetaan suomeksi starts from the very basic of Finnish and goes up to about level A2.2. The content of the book is spaced out nicely and comes with black-and-white pictures and some clear tables. The book is written completely in Finnish. The grammar is explained through examples, lists and tables, which make it easier to understand. You can find typical A1 level grammar topics such as the verbtypes, vowel harmony, the genitive case, the location cases and the imperative. It also includes A2 level topics such as the past tense, the present and past passive and verb rections.

Easy vocabulary topics in this book include typical A1 topics such as the numbers, telling the time, clothing items, basic adjectives and body parts. When discussing regular A1 vocabulary topics such as food and hobbies, these words are hooked together with healthy eating and the importance of exercise for your health. However, while advancing in this book, the vocabulary very quickly becomes much less useful for non-medical personnel. Many of the later chapters contain vocabulary that a regular learner has little use for, such as the different parts of blood, detailed information about internal organs, how to take care of wounds after a surgery, terminal care and pregnancy. Many of these topics are more around B1 level.

As a health care professional, you could potentially learn a lot from this book. However, it’s not the easiest book for self-study. The steep increase in difficulty can make it frustrating. There are other issues as well. For one, the book claims that there are digital exercises available, but these seem to have disappeared. In addition, while there are plenty of exercises in this book, unfortunately their solutions aren’t included. Last but not least, many of the exercises are listening exercises, but I haven’t been able to find any source for the audio.

Teach Yourself is an international series that has books for learning more than 50 different languages. Take the name of this book with a grain of salt: it’s by no means a complete Finnish learning book.

The first version of the Finnish book was published in 1993. The newest edition was published in 2017. When you start googling this book, you will find several versions with different names. It’s strange how this book is no longer sold on the Teach Yourself website. You can find several versions of this book in different places:

• Complete Finnish Beginner to Intermediate Course
• Teach Yourself Finnish Complete Course 1st Edition

The free audio tracks of this book will help you if you’re studying abroad. Listening to them repeatedly and studying them will help you if you’re studying Finnish outside of Finland. However, please realize that these dialogues are fairly stiff and formal. They don’t contain the slightest bit of spoken language, not even near the end of the book. They’re not useless, but if you’re in Finland, you will notice a stark difference between the audio of the book and what people actually say.

I find the structure of this book unclear and confusing. Chapters are crammed full of all types of different elements, which aren’t marked very clearly. The content isn’t bad as such, it’s just displayed in a chaotic fashion. Each chapter contains some information about Finnish culture, several dialogues and vocabulary lists for each section and some exercises.

Many of the exercises require the use of the audio. This is true for the listening and reading exercises. However, it’s also true for many of the vocabulary exercises. There are fairly many exercises where you’re supposed to say the translation of something said in the audio out loud. Most of the exercises either prompt you to translate a phrase, or they present you with a situation where you have to find an appropriate phrase to use.

The book contains useful vocabulary topics. The whole book is centered around conversational Finnish: conversations in the store, at the doctor’s, listening to and talking about the weather forecast, talking at the dinner table, etc. The book also includes many grammar topics, but you will have a hard time finding a specific topic from this book due to its unclear structure. Included are the typical A1-A2 grammar topics.

This book is suitable for self-study, as the name Teach Yourself already implies. I don’t think it’s a bad book if you’re studying Finnish abroad. However, do realize that the dialogues don’t necessarily prepare you for “real life Finnish”, that the vocabulary is limited to useful phrases, but not incredibly in-depth, and that you will need a lot more practice than this book allows for. Then again, I suppose that is true for any book. The solutions to the exercises are available in the back of the book.

This book includes spoken Finnish from the very beginning, which I think is a great approach. Whenever something new is introduced, the spoken language alternative will also be displayed. This means, for example, that in unit 1 you will learn the spoken language pronouns (e.g. mä, sä, se), while in unit 2 you are instantly taught how he menevät will be ne menee in spoken language.

It’s unfortunate that the book handles other parts of learning Finnish so poorly. Content is presented in a conversational style, but jumps from topic to topic in a disorganized manner. You will learn a lot of non-essential vocabulary in the very beginning. For example, the first unit includes the words kontrabasisti (double bass player), pyrstö (bird’s tail) and siipi (wing).

The grammar is also presented in unusual ways. This is true for the order in which you are taught things. The object (Syön omenan. Syön leipää.) is discussed in unit 3 and the plural partitive and plural location cases in chapter 5. In addition, it’s also noticeable in the grammar terms used: this book contains grammar terms and approaches that are generally not used in other sources available to language learners. For example, consonant gradation is called “consonant compression” in this book, and the explanation contains terms like “full box” and “tight lid”. The book also marks words as having an X-stem or a Q-stem, which is an unusual approach meant to help you deal with how words change when you add an ending to them. All of this means that, while using this book, you will learn a lot of “grammar terms” which are solely used in this one book and won’t be labeled the same way in other sources you’d be likely to use.

Colloquial Finnish contains exercises that are mainly meant to practice speaking Finnish – which is fairly difficult with a self-study book such as this. Some of the listening exercises do allow you to reply to a recording, which can help you practice your oral skills. Other exercises included prompt you to write your own dialogues according to the chapter’s text or translate phrases from English.

You can get this book as an ebook and as a paperback, but some of the prices listed are incredibly high. I suppose it may not matter, as I really don’t recommend buying this book. You can, however, listen to the audio online for free.

The book Suomea paremmin is no longer being printed, but you’re likely to find it in your local library if you live in Finland. It’s a black-and-white book with a clear structure to each chapter. Your library probably also has the CD this book is accompanied by.

Each chapter contains many dialogues with key vocabulary translated to English. Those are the only parts of this book where English is utilized. The grammar is explained in Finnish only, but is fairly simple to understand. Among the exercise types are questions meant to spark conversations (e.g. questions about whether you like traveling). You are encouraged to make your own sentences with the new vocabulary or grammar. There are also simple multiple choice, fill-in-the-gap and sentence construction exercises.

The grammar topics covered in this book include typical A2.1-A2.2 topics, such as the conditional, passive, imperative, comparisons, necessity sentences, the object and the third infinitive. There are also a few more difficult topics such as the on tehtävä construction and the comparative forms of adverbs.

The vocabulary topics covered in the beginning of this book are pretty typical A2 topics (e.g. traveling, health, moving), but it also contains more challenging B1 topics such as work meetings, Finnish history, natural disasters and elections. The chapter about traveling, for example, has dialogues related to reserving a trip at a travel agency, filing a complaint about a problem with a vacation and chatting about a vacation. It also has advertisements to read about several holiday destinations and a more difficult text describing a holiday location. The listening exercises in that chapter are a news report and a radio interview related to holidays.

The audio CD of Suomea paremmin contains both the written dialogues of the book and many additional listening exercises for each chapter. Most of the additional listening exercises contains spoken language, and they’re not slowed down like in many other books. These listening exercises are useful if you’re preparing for the YKI-testi. So are the reading exercises: they are taken from newspapers or online sources and not simplified too much. The reading and listening exercises are suitable to get you from level A2.2 to B1.1 and prepare you for the types of texts you will find in the test. Each of the reading texts just comes with a couple of questions to answer and aren’t analyzed beyond that. The book contains the answers to the exercises in the back.

This book is meant as a course book to help strengthen an intermediate student’s conversation skills. It’s hard to practice speaking on your own, so this book is not very suitable for self-study. If you’re looking into buying this book to study by yourself, please note that you will definitely also have to buy the audio, as well as the teacher’s guide.

Sainpas sanottua contains many sections with a couple of conversation prompts to discuss with a partner or in a small group. It contains many pronunciation exercises and, in addition, you can practice listening comprehension. You can buy two versions of the audio of the book. The first is a limited, cheaper version for students, which contains only part of the listening exercises (the pronunciation and fast-reply exercises). The other is the complete version with all the listening exercises. Without the audio, this book isn’t super useful.

The book contains many useful phrases for intermediate students, which could be beneficial if you’re looking to prepare yourself for YKI-testi. The topics covered in the book include the typical A2-level topics, such as communication in stores, talking about your hobbies, feelings, home and traveling. Even if you’re buying this book for self-study, you can use it to learn vocabulary and phrases which you will benefit from in the national YKI-test.

The solutions to the exercises are available in the teacher’s guide that must be purchased separately. In addition to the solutions, this teacher’s guide also includes the scripts of the listening exercises and extra exercises. Seeing how the book is meant to strengthen conversation skills, it of course contains a good amount of information about spoken language. Included are, for example, changes in pronunciation (kaks kahvii), spoken language pronouns and differences in verb conjugation.

Finnish Tutor was produced by the makers of the Teach Yourself series. They don’t sell this book on their website anymore, but you can find it through Amazon and book stores.

This book displays clearly what level each chapter or section is meant for (A2, B1 or B2). While the pages are pleasant to look at and contain nice tables and such, the structure of this book is unusual. Every chapter starts with grammar explanations. After explanations of the meaning, usage and formation of the chapter’s grammar topic, there are a couple of simple grammar exercises and vocabulary exercises. Next, there’s a reading text and a writing exercise. This is the reverse order of how much Finnish course books work: those usually start with the reading text rather than end with it.

A serious attempt has been made to include varied and useful types of reading and writing exercises: emails to friends, advertisements, product reviews, informational texts, job applications, biographies, letters of complaint, reporting about broken appliances, etc.

The focus of this book is very much on Finnish grammar. Each chapter does have a vocabulary topic, for which it includes some vocabulary and a reading and writing text. However, some of the reading texts feel as though their sole reason for existing is to display the grammar of the chapter. Grammar topics include A2.2-B1.1 level topics such as the third and fourth infinitive, demonstrative and relative pronouns, the translative, plural partitive, plural genitive and plural location cases and comparisons. There is also more advanced grammar included such as all the passive verb forms, the potential, and the modal, referative and temporal constructions.

A motivated student could get a lot out of this book, but to really digest the topics of each chapter, you will need additional sources. There is a clear lack of exercises, but you can always use this book in combination with other sources. The fact that it uses English probably attracts many students who are looking for a book to use for self-study. I don’t see why you couldn’t use it as such, as long as you don’t expect it to be the miracle book that teaches you everything. You’ll mostly learn grammar.

Unfortunately it seems that Tarinoita Suomesta is no longer in print. As such, you will have to rely on a Finnish library to borrow it, if you live in Finland. For some reason this book never really caught on.

This book contains 9 chapters, which all contain the following content. First, each chapter begins with a reading text, which is based on authentic Finnish content, such as newspaper articles and interviews. The texts are often several pages long. They’re accompanied by a wordlist, which gives the English translation of the important vocabulary in the text. The topics of the reading texts are very diverse and sometimes pretty sensitive. There’s one about the lives of Muslims in Finland, another about LGBT couples and there’s even a reading text that touches upon how a simple summer crush can lead to being raped.

Many of the exercises are prompts for conversations with another learner of Finnish, so the classroom aspect is very strong in this book. The book mentions that it works well as an additional source for texts for courses that are more focused on grammar. While the answers to the exercises are included in the back of the book, I don’t find the exercises very interesting. As mentioned above, if you’re looking for more unusual texts to read, this book has interesting ones. Still, I would not recommend this book for self-study. If you live in Finland, however, you could check it out in a library and make up your own mind.

Each chapter of Tarinoita Suomesta contains some vocabulary exercises and a small number of grammar exercises, both of which are generally prompts for conversation with a classmate. Generally there are also a few prompts for writing your own short text related to the chapter. There is also a listening exercise included in each chapter. You get the content of the listening exercise in writing and can listen to it via a CD. Each of these listening comprehension assignments comes with the same types of exercises as the reading texts.

The back of the book contains a basic overview of key grammar subjects needed to progress in the book. This book includes the following grammar topics: the third infinitive, the object, the plural partitive, the passive, conjunctions and participles. You can read about the conjugation of verbs and the inflection of nouns in the back of the book. Also included are the comparative forms of adjectives and adverbs and a short section on Finnish sentence types.

Don’t buy this book with the assumption that you will actually learn Finnish! Do buy this book if you want to learn more about how Finns behave and what makes Finnish social norms different from e.g. American norms.

This book comes in the form of a comic book. There isn’t a real story going on in it because the idea is just to give you an idea of how Finns use language and what type of language Finnish is. Every page contains 10 or 20 words in Finnish related to the topic of the page. Some of the vocabulary is great for beginners, but some of it is rare and not practical to use as a beginner.

A less catchy but more accurate name for this book would have been “Learn about Finnish and Finns without studying”.

The first part of the Ahaa! series is meant for total beginners. It’s written completely in Finnish, which makes it less suitable for self-study as an absolutely beginner. I wouldn’t recommend this book for self-study for multiple reasons, which I will be listing below.

The book follows the lives of three immigrants in Finland. It goes through common topics which a beginner learner of Finnish will need while living in Finland. This means it discusses topics such as asking for the price of things, visiting the doctor, buying bus tickets and asking for directions. As such, the vocabulary topics included are the typical A1.1-A1.3 topics: e.g. numbers, foods, body parts, clothes, hobbies, professions and family vocabulary.

The included grammar is also focused on the typical topics: the partitive, genitive and location cases, verbtypes, consonant gradation, täytyy-sentences and minulla on-sentences. Compared to other course books currently available for this level range, Ahaa! 1 has a slower pace. It’s more suitable for slower courses.

After that, each chapter comes with dozens of exercises, which are often accompanied by boxes or tables meant to show or explain a grammar or vocabulary element present in the text. The exercises are diverse, but there is a tendency for them to be more suitable for a classroom environment. There are conversation prompts, games that only work in a classroom setting, as well as functional exercises which require the students to go out into the “real world” (a Finnish environment). There are also quite a few listening exercises included. The answers to the exercises are included in the back of the book.

While I don’t think this book is very suitable for self-study, I think it’s an excellent tool for beginner students in slow-paced courses in Finland. Check out this video introducing the book and its contents.

The second part of the Ahaa! series starts from where the first ended. It’s written completely in Finnish, but I think this one is better suited for self-study than the first part. This book is similar in many ways to the first book. Both books mainly follow the fictional lives of three immigrants. They follow these characters through their lives in Finland

The reading texts in this book are already a lot more natural than in the first book. In addition to the familiar dialogues and narratives from the first book, each chapter also comes with a one-page section highlighting some of the forms typical for dialects of certain regions. This is a novel approach which you won’t find in many other course books. However, I feel that this book is neglecting general spoken language which is typical for the whole of Finland. The dialogues contain spoken language pronouns (e.g. mä, sä) but even extremely common forms such as mulla and mun aren’t used at all.

The stories of the characters in this book take them through multiple parts of their fictional new life in Finland. Included for example is their search for a new apartment (topics: rooms of a house, furniture, describing living environments, etc.), the process of getting a driver’s license (topics: traffic vocabulary and rules, car parts, expressing where you go), a visit to the pediatrician (topics: reserving an appointment, illnesses, healthy living), the process of applying for and starting a new job (topics: writing a CV and job application, describing your personality, job interviews), etc.

The grammar included in this book consists of typical A2-level topics such as the imperfect and perfect tense, the conditional and imperative moods, the third and fourth infinitive, postpositions and comparatives. However, starting from chapter 5, there’s a huge jump to the plural partitive. This book also includes the translative and essive cases, the relative joka-pronoun, present and past passive forms. As such, this book contains most of the topics that you will need to get to level B1.1. This is great, but I’m not sure if it fits together very well with the claim the book makes of being suitable for slower learners.

All in all, I think this book could work even for self-study abroad. It’s not perfectly suitable for this, because in part of the exercises you are instructed to discuss things in small groups, for example, or make presentations together. There is also the issue that there aren’t nearly enough exercises included. However, I think this book could work if you supplement it with other resources.

The aesthetics of Avain suomeen 1 are nice: the font is nice and big, nothing is crammed together and one page generally only holds one topic. The book starts from the very beginning and approaches Finnish through phrases and example sentences. Grammar is definitely not in the foreground for this book: it gets touched upon through examples, but isn’t ever really drilled in.

The themes in the book are the typical functional topics present in most books designed for learners in Finland. You learn typical phrases for ordering things in the store, visiting the doctor, making appointments, talking about your likes and dislikes, etc.

One strong side of this book is its use of spoken language, which is present in the book from the very beginning. The first chapter, for example, contains the numbers, which are displayed in a table so that “yks, kaks, kolme” are in column labeled “puhu” – while “yksi, kaksi, kolme” are in the neighboring column labeled “kirjoita“. Spoken language appears in all dialogues, but the book employs a system where certain fictional characters use more spoken language elements and others use less.

The book claims to be both good for self-study and as a course book. I think this book can work well for self-study abroad because it is simple and clear and doesn’t overload you with grammar. Do realize that everything is in Finnish though. The book mentions that it’s especially useful for groups of immigrants who haven’t had the chance to get an education in their home country.

Every chapter comes with exercises, many of which are actually listening exercises. Buying the CD is a good idea if you’ve decided to start using this book. In addition to listening comprehension, there are also many prompts for conversation with another language learner. The book also includes some exercises where you get to practice some simple grammar or vocabulary topic, generally in a context where a beginner might actually use them. For example, there are a couple of “answer this text message” and “fill this form” type of writing exercises. All in all, there aren’t nearly enough exercises for this book to work as your only source of learning, but it’s a nice start.

This book is the second part of the Avain Suomeen series. Just like part 1, it looks very appealing the way everything is spaced out, with the fairly big font and a limited amount of stuff crammed on each page.

Many of the texts in this book are dialogues between friends or in more official situations (e.g. at the doctor, at a job interview). They contain fairly natural general spoken language, which is one of the strong points of this book. The topics covered in these dialogues are fairly typical for intermediate course books for immigrants: moving house, planning a vacation, reporting problems, explaining your educational and professional history, etc. This book fits in well with the current tendency in courses for immigrants in Finland: about half of it is in some way related to working life.

In addition, students get to experience more formal Finnish as well. The book includes, for example, advertisements, house rules, job ads and newspaper articles. All these texts have been strongly simplified, but they are definitely more challenging than the dialogues.

The book itself states that it’s best suited for classroom use rather than on your own. This is especially apparent when you look at the exercise types in the book. There are many assignments where you’re instructed to chat with your neighbor or in small groups. In addition, there is a certain number of prompts to go out into the “the real world” and notice uses of Finnish there.

A number of the exercises prompt you to record yourself reading something out loud and then compare it to the CD. That’s an excellent idea for self-study! The number of listening exercises included in the book make it almost a necessity to also buy the CD, if you’re planning on making the best use of this book.

Just like part 1, grammar is not the main focus here at all. There are, however, definitely more tables displaying examples of cases and tenses than in book 1, so grammar is more present here. Grammar topics presented include: necessity sentences, third infinitive, imperfect and perfect tense, the comparative. Another similarity is that, when applicable, part 2 also displays spoken and written forms side by side. For example, when teaching the perfect tense, you get to see side by side that Mä oon syöny is spoken language for Minä olen syönyt, while the plural spoken language form is listed as Me ollaan syöty. This is a massive step that many previous course books have not taken.

The topics of many of the exercises in Avain Suomeen 2 mirror the type of assignments you’d get in the YKI-test. This is important because it prepares you for that big step, which many immigrants want to take. This book’s target, however, is A2.2, so not YKI’s B1 yet. Starting with these types of exercises early on is a good idea.

No niin! 1 introduces itself as a functional learning material that aims to encourage learners to use Finnish in everyday situations. The texts in the book follow the story of several families of immigrants and their life in Finland. Each chapter contains multiple texts, which are usually dialogues. The story of the families that play a part in the book advances through these dialogues.

No niin! 1 contains the vocabulary topics most course books follow at A1-A2 levels (e.g. food, weather, furniture, family, the clock, body parts, hobbies). Every chapter starts with a “picture dictionary”, the words of which are meant to be learned before starting the actual chapter. These words will then help understand the vocabulary used in the chapter. The grammar topics discussed in this book are the typical A1-A2 level topics. This means you can learn, for example, about the verbtypes, basic rections and the genitive, partitive and location cases.

Spoken language is taken somewhat into consideration through the inclusion of a character called Kaisa, who appears in every chapter and uses general spoken language (e.g. ihmiset menee, tossa kuvassa on, mun mies). The first chapter of this book gives some information about the differences between spoken and written Finnish, but other than that, spoken language is largely limited to some tidbits here and there and the presence of the Kaisa character.

This book contains “traditional” types of exercises (e.g. fill in the blanks, multiple choice, right or wrong, picture and word), which are all very closely tied to the exact vocabulary and grammar in the chapter. It also contains suggestions for more functional activities. These functional exercises are all aimed at students already living in Finland (e.g. “take some pictures of signs you’ve seen outside that you don’t understand” or “go to two stores and compare their prices”). Every chapter also contains at least one assignment to act out the dialogue with a partner. One nice thing is that the book contains quite many song suggestions which you can then go listen to on YouTube, for example.

The description on the back of the book says it’s suitable for all learners of Finnish, but that it is especially suitable for integration training courses. This is particularly noticeable in the functional exercises mentioned above. For self-study, I would suggest you first build up a little vocabulary before starting. This book starts from the very basics, and advances fairly slowly, so that makes it suitable for self-study.

The book is written completely in Finnish. Whether you consider this book suitable for self-study depends on whether you feel capable of using a book where only one language is used. If you’re considering using this book and all its parts for self-study, you could be looking at a pretty serious investment. In addition to the book, you’d also potentially have to buy the solutions of the exercises, the listening exercises and the digital exercises (which contain videos).

Coming soon!

Note that the book Oma suomi 1 has been rereleased in 2022. In online stores, you’re likely to come across “Uudistettu oma suomi 1”, eventhough the word uudistettu (reformed) doesn’t show up on the cover of the book. Most of what I wrote about the old version still holds true for the new version. In the new publication, there are more (especialyl short) listening exercises, more practice for pronunciation, as well as a new exercise type which was added into the new guidelines for teaching Finnish.

My first impression when leafing through Oma suomi 1 is that it’s pretty chaotic. It’s very colorful, with all kinds of pictures, exercises and reading texts with lots of details. This makes it appealing to leaf through but doesn’t offer a clear structure to base your studies on.

Each chapter contains more than one reading text of different types: dialogues, narrations and short texts meant to have an authentic feel. In addition, each chapter introduces multiple new grammar topics, which it explains using visual elements such as pictures, arrows and highlights. It has varied types of exercises and each chapter comes with a wordlist. The book doesn’t contain the solutions to the exercises, but you can buy them separately.

The Oma suomi series has been developed mainly to be used in a classroom setting in Finland. The classroom element is clear in some of the exercises, which instruct students to talk in small groups. The topics discussed are very close to the reality of life in Finland as an immigrant – it contains lots of everyday situations where Finnish is necessary. In addition, every chapter contains an “omat sivut” section, where students are urged to research services available near where they live, such as what their local health center’s phone number is or what kind of opportunities are available for hobbies and sports.

The vocabulary topics included are all typical for the A1-A2 language level: numbers, telling the time, talking about the weather, vocabulary related to food, furniture, body parts, professions, clothes, etc. Likewise, the grammar covered is typical for the same level range: verbtypes, partitive, genitive, consonant gradation, location cases, the imperfect, etc.

The pace of the book is fast: you’re supposed to get to level A2.2 in 230 pages. This is once again more for a classroom setting, where the teacher will provide additional exercises and lessons to support each chapter in the book. The topics presented in Oma suomi 1 go up to what is usually taught at level A2.2, but you will need to use additional sources if you’re using this book for self-study.

For an extra 10 euros, it was possible to get access to digital exercises for each chapter of the book. These are currently unavailable because the book has been republished. The adjusted interactive exercises should be back soon. While I’m not sure if Oma suomi 1 is worth buying for self-study, the digital exercises are fun. Some of them help you study new vocabulary or practice writing, and there are also some extra listening and reading exercises. They don’t form a course on their own, but I think they definitely add something to the experience.

Part two of the Oma suomi series is equally as colorful and chaotic as part one, with colored pictures, highlighted areas and tables. Just like part one, I find the lack of structure in this book distracting and confusing.

The format of each chapter does remain the same as in part 1: 1) dialogues written with some very light spoken language elements, 2) visual grammar explanations with lots of colors, arrows and highlights, 3) a variety of exercises, some of which are suitable only for students living in Finland, 4) a wordlist for new words.

This part of the Oma suomi series is chock-full of grammar topics, for which each gets one or two pages of exercises. As such, this is not a book to use by itself. You will need to practice each topic rather than just go over the rules and fill in a couple of exercises. Oma suomi 2 takes care to give a short mention of many more advanced grammar topics among the easier ones. This is probably the point where they assume the teacher will provide additional materials, or where the student branches out to other textbooks.

The grammar included is aimed towards students aspiring to level B1. For verbs, it includes the perfect and plusquamperfect, the passive and past passive, the third and fourth infinitive and the conditional. For nouns, you can find the plural partitive, genitive, illative and location cases, the translative and essive case and the comparative forms of adjectives and adverbs.

Each chapter in Oma suomi 2 includes a dialogue with some light spoken language features. In addition, there are many other types of texts included. Typical for these texts in that they’re very much based in reality. Through reading them, you get cultural information about Finland. They also show you what types of writing you will run into in real life in Finland. You will find the following types of texts in this book: CVs, formal and informal emails, advertisements, consumer feedback, informational texts and news articles.

Vocabulary themes in this book are practical and important things for anyone living in Finland: hobbies, traffic, living environment, emergency situations, job applications and health. There are a lot of functional elements. You learn, for example, how to request or propose something, how to express your opinion, how to react to things someone tells you, what types of things to mention in job interviews and how to complain about a faulty purchase.

The exercise types used in this book are very diverse and allow you to practice both grammar and vocabulary. A portion of them are clearly meant for a classroom setting as conversation starters. Every chapter also comes with listening exercises. The answers to the exercises can be purchased separately. Part two doesn’t come with digital exercises as part one did, which is a shame. It would have been nice to see how well they’d have done in order to fill in the huge gaps the fast pace of the book leaves!

One interesting thing about this series are the “omat sivut” pages, which often give you prompts and ideas for personal things related to the chapter’s topic you could talk or write about. Very often, these pages include things to be done in a classroom setting. This doesn’t make them useless for self-study. In fact, I think those pages are actually good for self-study because they draw attention to the fact that language is supposed to be a tool to talk about things that are important to you.

Coming soon!

Suomen mestari 1 takes you from the very basics, such as explaining where you’re from. This first part of the series covers the typical zero to A1.3 topics: weather, months, numbers, family, colors, the clock, furniture, food and professions. It pays special attention to actual language use, such as asking for help, directions or for the price of something, booking a room in a hotel, ordering in a restaurant and communicating in a clothing store. The grammar is also focused on the very basics, such as the verbtypes, consonant gradation, the imperative, the partitive and genitive case and postpositions.

Each chapter contains a reading text. After that you get a couple of pages of vocabulary related to the topic, often in the form of colorful pictures. Next, there’s a dialogue that’s also related to the theme. Each chapter contains several pages displaying the new grammar elements the chapter introduces. After that, you get a lot of exercises, such as listening exercises, fill-in-the gap grammar exercises, and conversation prompts to carry out in pairs or small groups.

This book is not new on the market, but a new version of it was released in the beginning of 2020. The new version is an improvement on the previous, so if you’re thinking of investing in this book, try to buy the latest version. You can find it by adding the word “uudistettu” to your google searches, or by using the links I provided above. I’m only linking to the “uudistettu” version because I figure the old one will disappear soon enough. There are a lot of materials available for this book, so this can be confusing.

If, however, you already own the old version, I don’t think the difference is so drastic that you should upgrade to the latest edition. The new book has a slightly larger format than the old one, which makes it more pleasant to look at. Many new exercises have been added to each chapter. The narratives present in each chapter of the old book are now dialogues, which are written in standard Finnish. However, the dialogues that were already present in the old version have now been made into spoken language dialogues.

The first book of this series advances slowly and steadily. It can work for self-study, if you can handle the fact that it’s written entirely in Finnish. Part of the exercises are also meant to be done with a partner. The book looks really nice and engaging, with the use of colors and pictures. The answers to all the exercises are included in the back of the book. The audio for the older version of this book is available for free, while the new book’s audio unfortunately must be bought.

Suomen mestari 2 has been updated so there are currently two versions on the market. I’m only linking to the renewed materials (which you can find yourself as well by googling “uudistettu“). I’m assuming they plan to release more materials to support this book soon. The older version of Suomen mestari 2 is from 2019.

This book continues where the first one ended and does so in a similarly slow and steady pace, up until it gets to the last two chapters, which are suddenly full of more difficult topics.

The grammar in the first part of Suomen mestari 2 is typical for more or less level A2.1-A2.2: the past tense, the perfect tense, rections, the third and fourth infinitive, and the object. In the last two chapters, we take a jump into the plural location cases, plural partitive and plural genitive. This is strange when the third book dives back into the passive and conditional conjugations. It’s likely this was done in order to not make Suomen mestari 2 too verb-oriented, as it already contains very many verb forms.

The reading texts get more challenging as you advance through the chapters, but it’s a pretty smooth ride with little to no jumps in the level required to read the texts. Topics covered in the book relate to, for example, hobbies, nature, traveling, health, education and Finnish culture.

Just like in the first book, the construction of each chapter in Suomen mestari 2 is very clear and easy to follow. Each chapter starts with a reading text, which is generally a mix of some narrative text and a dialogue related to it. After that, each chapter comes with pictures and word lists with vocabulary related to the topic of the chapter. For example, after a text about a trip to the summer cottage, you get pictures and words related to Finnish nature. After the vocabulary pages, all the new grammar of the chapter is explained. This takes multiple pages because all the grammar is combined in that one section. I think the idea is that you jump back and forth between the grammar pages and the exercise pages as you process the grammar.

Then, there are the exercises, which often take more than ten pages per chapter. There are reading comprehension, listening and grammar exercises. In addition to plain grammar exercises, a good attempt has been made to also include exercises that instruct you to form your own sentences. In addition, every chapter has some exercises which are meant for a classroom setting, because you’re instructed to work in pairs. The answers to the exercises are included in the back of the book.

As is the case for most books on the market, this book is completely in Finnish and contains exercises that are designed for a classroom setting. However, I think Suomen mestari 2 is pretty nice for self-study. Its slow pace, the way it displays new vocabulary and the abundance of exercises (with solutions!) allow you to benefit from this book in self-study. I think it would be important to also invest in the listening exercises. You can find this book and its listening exercises in every Finnish library, because it’s been very popular.

In Suomen mestari 3, there seems to be an abrupt increase in the length (and to some extent also in difficulty) of the reading texts compared to the earlier books. Another big difference between the second book and the third book is the usage of spoken language. In Suomen mestari 3, most of the texts are written in spoken language.

Spoken language is used in all the dialogues. Included are many of the elements present in spoken language. This book does not limit itself to just personal pronouns. You get sentences such as “mä en oo vielä vastannu” and “mä tuun meiän yläkerran naapurin kans sisään“. This is important because that’s the way Finnish is actually spoken. Suomen mestari 3 does include written Finnish. It does this in a logical and consistent manner. There’s a clear division between texts that would generally be written in standard Finnish (newspaper articles, official emails, explanations about Finnish history) and texts that generally are written in spoken Finnish (emails to friends, postcards, text messages).

Each chapter starts with a reading text or dialogue (or both), followed by several pages of vocabulary lists and grammar explanations. These are followed by a large number of exercises. The exercises allow you to practice both the grammar and the vocabulary of the chapter. There are traditional exercises such as fill-in-the-gaps and rephrasing exercises as well as other types of exercises.

Vocabulary topics present in Suomen mestari 3 cover more abstract topics than the previous books. You can find, for example, content related to Finnish culture and art, protection of the environment, Finland’s history, geography and social life. Combined with this are topics that immigrants in Finland might run into, such as writing an email about one’s residence permit to the police. There are also several topics which require the learner to compare the situation in their home country to that in Finland (e.g. family and city life). Being able to compare more abstract topics is of great importance if you intend to participate in the YKI-testi. A lot of detail has also been put into expressing your opinion and feelings.

The grammar of Suomen mestari 3 contains verb forms that are pretty often glanced over in other course books. The normal A2.1-A2.2 verb topics are covered (e.g. the conditional and passive), but they’ve been expanded to contain, for example, the perfect conditional (olisin tehnyt), the passive conditional (tehtäisiin) and the passive plusquamperfect (oli tehty). In addition to verbs, the book also looks at the translative and essive case, inflection of the comparative and superlative, transitivity, feeling verbs and rections, which will help you get to level B1. While the verb forms included in this book may go beyond the A2.2-level it says it’s aimed at, each chapter contains valuable phrases and grammar tidbits.

This book is meant to be a classroom course book, which is apparent in a portion of the exercises. Each chapter comes with classroom discussion prompts to do in pairs. However, I would say that this book is suitable for self-study. It’s amazing that you can listen to the dialogues online for free. In addition, the answers to all the exercises are included in the back of the book.  If you’re using the book on your own, you should jump back and forth within the chapter, in order to combine the grammar explanations with the exercises. This is necessary because all the grammar is collected in one section which is located prior to the section with all the exercises.

Because the Suomen mestari series has four books, the writers have kept the participle forms and constructions out of the third book completely. I find this important because students aiming to participate in YKI-testi often attach too much importance to these verb forms. While it’s beneficial to be able to recognize the most common ones, you don’t need to be able to create these forms yourself nor know every little detail about them.

I think Suomen mestari 4 is very nice for students who are already level B1 and are working on getting to level B2. If you’re mainly looking for a book to learn and practice participles and lauseenvastikkeet, you will also get a lot out of this book, as each chapter covers a different participle or construction. In addition to these, the book pays special attention to word types and their derivation, rections and transitivity. I personally consider those much more important than the participles. The book starts by teaching you one participle at a time, and then starts combining them when getting to participle constructions and other complex sentence types.

Because this book is mainly aimed at students who have already achieved level B1.1, the reading texts are focused on more abstract, informational and general knowledge topics. It contains, for example, texts related to architecture, natural catastrophes, crime and geography. These texts are generally pretty long and fairly dry. Each chapter also includes a dialogue, which is written in near to natural sounding spoken Finnish.

Just like the other books in the series, this book has a lot of exercises. I find these much more repetitive in this book than in previous parts, which is largely because some many of them are related to participles. A large portion requires you to rephrase sentences. There are other exercise types as well, such as useful vocabulary exercises and listening comprehension.

The last book of the Suomen mestari series feels more rushed than the other parts. This is noticeable by how many new things are introduced in each chapter. The writers have also been unable to continue the system of introducing one vocabulary topic per chapter: the chapters contain a lot of random vocabulary. This book can feel too difficult to students who have just made it to level B1.1.

Suomen mestari 4 could be suitable for self-study. You can stream the audio online for free, which is a definite asset, and the solutions to the exercises are included in the back of the book. Some exercise types do not lend themselves to self-study (mainly conversation prompts), but at this level, you should be able to use those exercises in different ways if you have no one to do them with.

I think Suomi sujuvaksi 1 is a pretty nice book when you are learning basic Finnish. It’s written completely in Finnish, which can make it tricky to start with if you know no Finnish at all yet. If you have some very basic Finnish under your belt already, this is a good self-study book. Its A4 format allows for more empty space and therefore space to write in.

Each chapter contains at least one reading text (a narrative or a dialogue). The vocabulary of the chapters is often presented in nice black-and-white drawings. The topics are mostly the typical A1 level things, such as food, household appliances, clothing items, places in the city, the weather, illnesses and body parts.

Suomi sujuvaksi 1 contains typical level A1 grammar topics, such as vowel harmony, the verbtypes, the partitive and genitive, location cases, necessity sentences and postpositions. Also included are level A2 grammar topics, such as the imperfect, perfect and plusquamperfect, location case rections, the joka-pronoun and different word types (e.g. words ending in -ton, -tar or -s). The back of the book has an extra section with grammar explanations. One reason why I do recommend this book for self-study is that the rections and word types are addressed in small chunks throughout the book. This is not an approach unique to this book, but I feel it is done very well here. In addition, the grammar section in the back of the book includes additional information about the rections as well as the inflection or conjugation of the vocabulary.

The exercise types in Suomi sujuvaksi 1 are very traditional: most of them are fill-in-the-gap grammar exercises. This suited me as a language learner, because that’s how I was used to learning grammar. Many other language learning books have somewhat moved away from this exercise type. The solutions to the exercises are available online in a free PDF!

Just like part 1, Suomi sujuvaksi 2 comes in A4 copy paper format, which makes it nice for self-study because you can write in the book. The font is smaller than in the first book. The first book came with an audio CD, but this second book doesn’t.

This book includes the following grammar topics: the fourth infinitive, the imperative, all the passive verb forms (e.g. present passive, imperfect, conditional), the plural cases (e.g. partitive, genitive, illative), the essive and translative, existential sentences, complement sentences, etc.

Each chapter contains reading texts, which often give you information about Finland’s geography, history, nature and culture. The book also includes dialogues, some of which are written in standard Finnish, while others are written in Helsinki spoken language. The amount of spoken language features in these dialogues increases gradually.

Suomi sujuvaksi 2 contains mainly grammar exercises, which generally require you to fill in the gaps or make sentences with words provided. The answers to the exercises can be found on the Gaudeamus website for free.

Suomea suomeksi was one of the first books for learning Finnish to come into existence, back in the 1970s! This classic has of course been updated and renewed multiple times. Many people who have used this book in the early stages of their Finnish studies consider it one of the best.

This book introduces new topics one by one, and continuously builds on earlier knowledge. This is in contrast with many modern course books. Often, modern writers find it to be important to make students aware from the beginning that they don’t need to understand every single word in order to listen to or read Finnish. Because Suomea suomeksi continuously builds on previous knowledge, I feel it doesn’t prepare students for the real world, where they won’t be able to understand every single word.

This book starts from the very basics and moves quite swiftly. Each chapter covers new grammar topics, which are presented at the very beginning of each chapter in a colored box. Next, there are several sections of short dialogues. Generally there is a second colored box that lists some observations of other grammar details in these dialogues. Next, you can find some grammar exercises, which require you to conjugate or inflect certain words, for example, or to rephrase things according to that chapter’s grammar topic.

The grammar in this book covers typical A1-A2 topics (e.g. verbtypes, partitive, imperative, past tense, third and fourth infinitive). Certain topics have been added to part 2 of this series instead (e.g. conditional and passive). Because each chapter introduces a brand-new grammar subject, and has it mainly explained in a table on one single page, I think you will definitely need another source to get a more complete idea of the grammar.

The vocabulary in this book isn’t themed, nor displayed in handy tables in each chapter. New vocabulary is added in each chapter in the dialogues. There used to be a series of vocabulary list books available in 20 different languages. These seem to have been discontinued right now. Still available is a book with exercises, which apparently comes with a CD. I’ve reserved this package from a library in a nearby region, so I’ll take a look at that book when it arrives.

Whether you consider this book suitable for self-study depends on whether you feel capable of using a book where only one language is used. The grammar isn’t explained in this book with many words, so a reference grammar book such as Leila White’s could help you there. The fact that the solutions to the exercises are not included is a big drawback, although this book is accompanied by an exercise book, which does have the solutions to all the exercises there. Using the two together and adding a third English grammar book could be a working combination. I’m not convinced, however, that it prepares you adequately for “real Finnish”.

Suomen harjoituksia 1 is meant to accompany the book Suomea suomeksi 1 (see 3.8.1. above). You can’t buy this book in Finland anymore, but it’s still available on Amazon for now.

This book contains additional exercises for each chapter of Olli Nuutinen’s book. The exercises are very traditional fill-in-the-gaps and rephrase grammar exercises. The vocabulary used in these exercises mostly matches up with the course book. So does the grammar, though Hämäläinen has added some additional grammar explanations concerning the participle constructions. The solutions to all the exercises are included in the back of the book. The audio CDs available allow you to drill all the exercises orally. They also include some additional listening exercises.

Compared to the first book of this series, I think Suomea suomeksi 2 is less grammar focused and allows you to expand your vocabulary further. The vocabulary in this book isn’t themed, nor displayed in handy tables in each chapter. There is, or was, a series of vocabulary list books available in 20 different languages. The only ones I’ve found for sale right now is the Danish version.

Part two of the Suomea suomeksi series continues where part one left off, with A2.1-A2.2 grammar topics such as the passive and the conditional, as well as B1+ topics such as a pretty detailed look at participle constructions and rare cases such as the comitative, abessive and the conjugation of verbs in the potential form. The grammar is explained at the beginning of each chapter, after which are several reading texts which contain examples.

Each chapter also has a couple of grammar exercises, which are generally either fill-in-the-gap exercises or the type where you have to rephrase sentences so that they include the new grammar topic. This book doesn’t contain the answers to the exercises. There’s an exercise book meant to accompany it, which contains many more exercises as well as more grammar explanation. However, this book is no longer being printed, so you’ll have to see if you can find it in your local Finnish library. The exercise book is called Suomen harjoituksia 2, is written by Eila Hämäläinen and was originally published by Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura.

The texts (narratives and dialogues) become longer the further along in the book you get. The dialogues in this book are at times pretty good, with lots of useful phrases (e.g. Voi voi, hyvänen aika, en valitettavasti pääsekään). I also like the abundant use of the suffixes -han/hän and -kaan/kään. However, sometimes the dialogues are full of grammar forms that just aren’t used in spoken language. This makes them sound unnatural. In addition, the dialogues all contain standard Finnish, with the exception of the texts that deal with the passive forms (me-passive).

The topics of the reading texts in Suomea suomeksi 2 are often random everyday conversation topics. Included are, for example, conversations in which people are talking about a stain on a shirt, discussing why someone wasn’t invited to a party, talking about siblings, and expressing their opinion about what’s on tv. These are all pretty nice topics, which are approached with clear and common vocabulary. I think by keeping the text fairly simple, the author has attempted to strike a balance with the increasingly difficult grammar forms, which will be easier to understand in a simpler text. The vocabulary is mostly suitable for students of level A2.2, while the grammar is more at B1.1 level.

All in all, I’d say Suomea suomeksi 2 is more useful than the first part and also more suitable for self-study. It’s too bad the solutions to the exercises aren’t included in the back of the book. You will be able to find this series in Finnish libraries, but I think it will slowly disappear, now that there are better options around.

Suomen harjoituksia 2 is meant to accompany the book Suomea suomeksi 2 (see 3.8.3. above). You’ll have to see if your local Finnish library still has this book, because it’s not being printed anymore.

This book contains additional exercises for each chapter of Olli Nuutinen’s book. The exercises are very traditional fill-in-the-gaps and rephrase grammar exercises. The vocabulary used in these exercises mostly matches up with the course book. So does the grammar, though Hämäläinen has added some additional grammar explanations concerning the participle constructions. The solutions to all the exercises are included in the back of the book.

This is another oldie: the first version of Suomen kielen alkeisoppikirja was published in 1987! The most recent edition is from 2010 but it is no longer in print. You can definitely still get this book in Finnish libraries. The book comes with a CD, which allows you to listen to the texts and dialogues of the book. Most libraries should also have the CD. Weirdly enough, the additional material with all the translated wordlists is still available for purchase. This book is the first in a two-book series, the second book is called Suomen kielen jatko-oppikirja (see section 3.9.3).

Suomen kielen alkeisoppikirja is very focused on grammar, which is usually displayed in clear tables. Each chapter contains one regular reading text as well as multiple short dialogues. These dialogues mimic real life situations in places such as restaurants, the post office and the store. However, while the dialogues and texts are based on real situations an immigrant could find themself in, they often mainly seem to be an opportunity to display the grammar of each chapter. As such, this book does serve a purpose if you’re looking for a grammar book which displays the grammar elements in reading texts.

The grammar included in Suomen kielen alkeisoppikirja covers the typical A1-A2 topics, such as the verbtypes and the most common cases and tenses. It showcases different word types (e.g. words ending in -uus or -in) throughout the book. Each chapter also includes some trivia related to Finnish grammar or vocabulary, such as the usage of vastaan and vastassa, less common ways to ask what something costs and the difference between a passive sentence and a generic sentence.

There aren’t any exercises in this book, but there is an exercise book meant to accompany it. However, the exercise book Harjoituskirja suomen kielen perusopetusta varten is also no longer in print. It’s probably also fairly rare in Finnish libraries. You can read more about this book in section 3.9.2.

If you’re just looking for simple, repetitive exercises for beginner to intermediate students, this book is pretty good. There are two problems though: it’s no longer in print and the solutions aren’t included.

The topics covered in this book’s exercises follow the textbook Suomen kielen alkeisoppikirja to the letter. However, this book can just as well be used on its own. The exercise types in this book are very repetitive: you either put a word between brackets in the correct grammar form, or you form a sentence based on the example provided. If that’s the sort of exercise you’re used to when learning languages, you might really like this book.

Suomen kielen jatko-oppikirja is in another of those strange situations where the original book is no longer for sale, but the exercise book is still available for purchase. This book is part two of the series, after Suomen kielen alkeisoppikirja. Both books look very similar, with appealing tables displaying the grammar and small black-and-white drawings.

While the first book very strongly focused on dialogues, Suomen kielen jatko-oppikirja has more regular texts. This makes sense when you look at the grammar which is taught in this book. Things such as participles, the potential, the passive conditional, the instructive and the comitative are rare in spoken language. Other grammar topics include comparisons, particles such as –kaan and –han, the use of kumpikin and molemmat, the third person imperative, verbtype 6 and the inflection of numbers.

Many of the reading texts give you the opportunity to learn more about Finnish history and literature. The dialogues in each chapter don’t follow a particular theme; they seem to mainly exist to display the grammar taught in each chapter. The dialogues have been written in standard Finnish. The very last chapter of the book deals with spoken language. It addresses most of the differences in pronunciation between written and spoken Finnish, and includes dialogues written in the dialects of Helsinki, Häme and Karelia.

There aren’t any exercises in this book, but Harjoituskirja suomen kielen jatko-opetusta varten (which is the exercise book meant to accompany this book) is still in print!

This harjoituskirja accompanies the grammar and reading book called Suomen kielen jatko-oppikirja. As such, the chapters and content of these books match up perfectly. Grammar topics include: participles, the potential, the passive conditional, the instructive and the comitative, particles such as –kaan and –han, the use of kumpikin and molemmat, the third person imperative, verbtype 6 and the inflection of numbers.

This could be s nice book for studying advanced grammar through exercises, but unfortunately the solutions to the exercises are not included. It mainly contains the types of exercises that require you to put words between brackets in the right form, or to rephrase sentences in order for them to contain the grammar topic addressed in the chapter.

All in all, this series is very much focused on grammar. The vocabulary used in the exercises is not specifically relevant to the vocabulary in the grammar book.

The first part of the Suomen kielen tikapuut series starts from the very beginning of Finnish language learning. It should allow you to get to about level A2.1-A2.2.

Each chapter contains at least one dialogue to read. The dialogues start out really easy and gradually get harder and longer. They are simple enough to be perfect for self-study. The book follows the lives of several people. First, you follow the characters äiti and Sanna, a 3 year old. As you advance, other characters are added, such as an immigrant called Ben Winter. The new vocabulary of the reading texts is listed in a Finnish-English vocabulary list. The reading texts don’t cover any special A1 level topics; you just get a sneak peek into the everyday life of the main characters.

Each chapter in the book starts with a grammar section, where the new topic is explained in simple Finnish. You will need to use additional sources to get a full understanding of the grammar topics. However, the exercises related to each grammar subject in this book are generally so simple that you can manage without those additional sources.

You can find typical A1 level grammar topics, such as vowel harmony, the partitive, the genitive, T-plural, location cases, the verbtypes and necessity sentences. It also includes some simple complement exercises, and introduces consonant gradation of both wordtype A and wordtype B at the same time.

The types of exercises included are suitable for self-study, but unfortunately the solutions aren’t available anywhere. There are some translation exercises, where you’re given English sentences to translate to Finnish. There are also exercises to make sentences out of separate words. You can also find fill-in-the-gap exercises. All the exercises are grammar focused, allowing you to practice the grammar of the chapter.

This book would be very suitable for self-study, were it not for two issues. First, this series is no longer in print. You’ll have to get it from, for example, your local library. If you find the green A4 size covered book there, you’re dealing with the older version. Second, the solutions to the exercises are not available anywhere. These two issues are really a shame.

The second part of the Suomen kielen tikapuut series presents its A2-B1 grammar topics in an order that differs from most other textbooks. It includes A2.1-A2.2 level topics such as the conditional, the perfect tense and plusquamperfect tense, the object, the comparative forms, postpositions and prepositions and the joka-pronoun. In addition, you can learn grammar topics that get you up to level B1, such as the plural partitive, plural genitive and plural location cases.

Each chapter of Alkeistaso 2 contains at least one dialogue to read, which continues to follow the lives of the characters in the first book. The dialogues are centered around random everyday events and conversation topics. The progression of difficulty in the reading texts is quite gradual, although the grammar topics included in them get more complicated fairly quickly. The new vocabulary of the reading texts is listed in a Finnish-English vocabulary list.

Just like the first book, Alkeistaso 2 displays a new grammar topic at the beginning of each chapter, where the new topic is explained in simple Finnish. You will need to use additional sources to get a full understanding of the grammar topics. However, the exercises related to each grammar subject in this book are generally so simple that you can manage without additional resources. There is always an example provided which shows you what your answer should look like.

The exercise types in Alkeistaso 2 are the same as in Alkeistaso 1. They are suitable for self-study, but unfortunately the solutions aren’t available anywhere. You get translation exercises, where you’re given English sentences to translate to Finnish. There are also exercises to make sentences out of separate words. You can also find fill-in-the-gap exercises. All the exercises are grammar focused, allowing you to practice the grammar of the chapter.

When considering how suitable this book is for self-study, you have the same issue as for the first book. It would be very suitable for self-study, were it not for two issues. First, this series is no longer in print. You’ll have to get it from, for example, your local library. Second, the solutions to the exercises are not available anywhere.

Just like the first two books, the third part of the Suomen kielen tikapuut series presents its grammar topics in an order that differs from most other textbooks. For example, the third infinitive and the passive are generally taught earlier on. In this series, they are presented in their entirety: both very common and rare uses of the forms are included in Jatkotaso 1.

Grammar topics covered in Jatkotaso 1 include the third infinitive, the essive, the translative, the passive, passive imperfect and passive conditional, inflection of the numbers, the participles and participle constructions. These topics appear in the reading texts, which are quite dense and complicated. You will have your work cut out trying to understand these texts. Topics covered are rarely any typical everyday life situations as was the case in the first two books. Instead, you find informational texts concerning topics like Finnish ice hockey teams, Elias Lönnrot and Kalevala, the history of the Olympic Games, Finnish history and some politics.

The exercises in Jatkotaso 1 are grammar focused. The same exercise types repeat in this whole series: fill-in-the-gap exercises and exercises where you have to rephrase sentences in order to have them contain the new grammar. There is always an example provided which shows you when your answer will look like. These exercises are suitable for self-study, but unfortunately the solutions aren’t available anywhere.

When considering how suitable Jatkotaso 1 is for self-study, you have the same issue as with the previous books. It could be suitable for self-study but it’s no longer in print and the solutions to the exercises are not available anywhere. In addition, I personally find the reading texts in this part of the series very dry and uninteresting.

The final book of this series has the same type of content as the previous books. Each chapter introduces a new grammar topic, which is then displayed in a reading text. The exercises are focused on grammar and generally either require you to fill in gaps, or rephrase given sentences so they include the grammar element. There is always an example given of what is expected of you.

Grammar topics covered in Jatkotaso 2 include rarer Finnish cases (abessive, comitative, instructive), the potential, transitivity and intransitivity, clitics (-kin/-kaan, -pa/pä, -han/hän), temporaalirakenne, all the imperative forms (including the jussive).

The reading texts in Jatkotaso 2 seem less dense to me than the ones in Jatkotaso 1. This is mainly the case because this book contains fewer texts about history and more prose, such as a short detective story. Some dialogues between people about random everyday topics are also included.

When considering how suitable Jatkotaso 2 is for self-study, you have the same issue as with the previous books. It could be suitable for self-study but it’s no longer in print and the solutions to the exercises are not available anywhere. The grammar covered here is useful if you’re aiming to get to the C-level.

This is an ancient book, so its approach to learning Finnish is different to more modern books. The way everything is presented reminds me of the Suomea suomeksi series (see section 3.8). This is especially true for the verb choices: the first 50 pages of Finnish for Foreigners 1 book contain a very limited amount of verbs. In the first ten chapters, the main verb used is olla “to be”. Even beyond that, the grammar early on is mainly focused on constructions that contain the verb olla. It’s a sensible way to limit the amount of new content presented, but differs from more current course books, where you learn to use different verbs early on.

This book used to be accompanied by some audio cassettes and I’m pretty sure there also used to be CDs with the audio at some point, but I haven’t been able to track those down. The exercise book does come with audio.

It surprised me that I actually don’t find the book too bad for self-study on closer inspection. It’s far from perfect, but when you read all the reviews on this page, you’ll come to the conclusion that none of the books currently available are perfect. The biggest plus is of course how widely available it is. The use of English is also helpful for self-study: all the dialogues are presented in both Finnish and English and there are vocabulary lists and grammar explanations in English as well.

Finnish for Foreigners 1 contains very limited spoken language elements, so it definitely doesn’t live up to the goal stated in the introduction: “The purpose of Finnish for Foreigners 1 is, above all, to teach the learner spoken Finnish”. This goal, it seems, should be interpreted as an intention to teach the type of Finnish needed in practical everyday situations. The dialogues don’t contain any spoken language pronunciation elements such as mä, mun, mulla or tää, toi, se, or other very common spoken language elements. Everyday language situations included are, for example, buying clothes, giving directions, talking about where you live, about the weather and how to speak on the phone.

Grammar topics are introduced gradually and kept fairly limited so as not to overwhelm the learner. The order of the topics differs from what is the norm these days. The book includes typical beginner topics but it also includes topics that would generally not be taught until later. The book has 40 chapters. It contains A1 level topics such as the genitive (chapter 6), the partitive (chapter 14) and location cases (which are each introduced in a separate chapter; in chapters 8, 10, 13, 19, 20). It also contains A2 level topics such as the past tense, the third infinitive, postpositions and the object. More advanced topics such as the plural partitive, the plural genitive, the complement, essive, translative and comparative forms are also included.

One of the best aspects of this book is how it introduces grammar topics for both beginners and advanced learners from early on. While some of these topics are fairly difficult, they are kept simple enough to be manageable. Problems will probably only arise when the student using this book decides to try to learn some more about these grammar topics from other sources. That’s when you may become overwhelmed by how advanced these topics are, and which are presented in such a deceivingly simple way in this book. This is definitely not a book designed to be used alongside other books – perhaps with the exception of the Suomea suomeksi series (see section 3.8) which follows the same approach.

Big disclaimer: while you can learn beginner Finnish with this book, keep in mind that you will be exposed to stiff dialogues which will make you sound like someone traveling to the current day from the 1960s!

I’m not a big fan of this book. The exercise types in this book are not super engaging, but they’re important if you decide to start using this book. As mentioned in section 3.11.1, this book introduces – in addition to regular beginner grammar topics – advanced grammar subjects, which it keeps simple by limiting their scope. The exercise book is similarly limited and is thus useful because of that.

Most of the exercises relate to grammar. They include, for example, fill-in-the-gap exercises where you’re supposed to inflect or conjugate words into the correct form. There are also many grammar drilling exercises where you’re supposed to rephrase a sentence following the example given. You can also find some pictures in this exercise book which allow you to visualize the things you are practicing a little better. Each chapter also comes with an extra reading text concerning the same topic as the text book’s chapter. These texts come with some simple reading comprehension questions.

Finnish for Foreigners 1 Exercises also includes some listening comprehension exercises. The original book came with cassettes, but CD versions have also been available. However, a search online hasn’t revealed any sources that still sell the audio. If you find this book in the library, you might be lucky enough to get a version with the CDs included. The texts of these listening exercises are included in the back of the book with the solutions.

Part two of the Finnish for Foreigners series contains two large chunks of advanced grammar. Firstly, there are chapters on each of the participle constructions, including the että-participle, the -TTAVA necessity structure and the long form of the first infinitive.  Secondly, the book walks you through all the passive verb forms. Included are the present, past, conditional and perfect passive forms. Other advanced grammar topics in this book are, for example, the potential mood, the abessive, the comitative, the instructive and the inflection of comparative forms. Here and there, you can find information about tricky words and their inflection, such as itse, kukaan and mikään, joku and jokin, as well as kumpikin and jompikumpi.

The book is very much focused on grammar. Each chapter contains a reading text, but very often they seem to serve no other purpose than to display the grammar topics covered in the chapter. The first part of this book contains mainly dialogues, while the latter half contains fictional narratives as well as informational texts about Finnish culture. The reading texts are no longer fully translated into English as they were in Finnish for Foreigners 1. Each reading text does come with a Finnish-English vocabulary list.

This book is old enough to have been originally sold with several cassettes containing the audio of the reading texts. If you’re in Finland, you might be able to find this book in the library with two audio CDs. These CDs don’t seem to be available for sale anymore.

If your goal is mainly to just learn as much grammar as possible, this book does an okay job at providing you with relevant content. However, if your intention is to learn to communicate in Finnish, I would not recommend this book. Rather, you should invest in another series to strengthen what you learned in the first part of this series. I would suggest you check out the Suomen mestari series, and perhaps combine it with Suomen kielen tikapuut. You could perhaps return to Finnish for Foreigners 2 after you’ve worked with another book.

Finnish for Foreigners 2 Exercises mainly allows you to practice the grammar present in the main textbook. The exercise types are often very traditional. There are, for example, a large amount of exercises where you’re prompted to rephrase sentences to include a grammar element, following the example provided. You can also find quite a few fill-in-the-gap exercises.

The book also contains listening comprehension exercises, which you probably won’t be able to do because getting your hands on the audio could be incredibly challenging. You could perhaps use these as reading comprehension exercises because the full text of the listening exercises is included in the back of the book.

Each chapter also contains an additional reading comprehension exercise, which are often quite abstract. What makes them even less appealing is that they’re presented in a very dense manner with nearly no line spacing. Many of these texts are authentic texts which have been simplified slightly. Through these texts, you can learn more about Finland and Finnish culture.

I wouldn’t recommend buying this book, just as I wouldn’t recommend the textbook it is meant to accompany, to students who are trying to learn to communicate orally in Finnish. Even if your main goal is just to learn as much grammar as possible, many of the exercises in this book don’t seem to be very engaging or useful.

This book’s extra content hasn’t aged well. It originally came with a VHS with all the texts of the book acted out. You can find those videos on YouTube, luckily. These videos follow the fictional lives of Jutta and her friends in Helsinki. Unfortunately the dialogues (and the acting) are painfully stiff and unnatural. There is no spoken language at all in these dialogues: they’re just standard, simplified Finnish. The topics of the dialogues are often related to Finnish culture, e.g. Jutta goes to a Christmas concert, celebrates name days and visits Suomenlinna.

Another very old element is that the prices appear in Finnish marks rather than euros! The book does mention in these situations that Finland started using euros in 2002, but they haven’t changed the currency in the reading texts because the videos still contain the old text.

Apart from that, I’ve always really liked Kuulostaa hyvältä. Each chapter comes with many exercises which allow you to practice both the grammar and the vocabulary. For me, the exercise types felt engaging and meaningful. The exercise types include fill-in-the-gaps exercises, creating your own sentences according to the model answer and the inflection of nouns and verbs. The answers to the exercises are included in the back of the book.

A nice feature in Kuulostaa hyvältä is that you get two reading texts in every chapter: first the dialogue which matches up with the videos, and then a rephrased versions which tells the same things but in narrative form rather than a dialogue. This allows you to revise the vocabulary in a slightly different form.

While the book allows you to practice the grammar topics present in each dialogue, it doesn’t explain these grammar elements at all. The only notable exception is in chapter 4, where the German Jutta explains the rules of the complement to Anssi, a Finn (pretty realistic). This book doesn’t include any grammar explanations; there is a separate book available that includes these explanations. The second book is written in English (see the next book on this page).

I think Kuulostaa hyvältä is suitable for self-study if you start using it when you already have a good basic vocabulary and grammar. Starting from zero with this book on your own seems tricky, even if you buy both books. Combining both books could work, as you can read the grammar in English in one book and read the texts and do the exercises in the other. However, I can imagine that the grammar would overwhelm most students, as the book jumps from easy topics to hard topics and back again without much of a system.

Grammar topics of around A1 level include, for example, the imperative, postpositions and the location cases. Grammar topics of around A2.1 level include the past tense, conditional and passive. In addition, you can find the participles, sentence constructions such as lukevinaan, the comparison of adverbs and all the plural cases. I feel like the basics don’t get enough attention before moving on to the rarer grammar.

This book (called Sounds good – Kuulostaa hyvältä) is the additional material for the book Kuulostaa hyvältä – Sounds good by the same author. Yes, the names of these books are almost the same! I’m referring to them based on the first part of their name in this section.

Kuulostaa hyvältä has been reviewed in the previous section, so you should read that review first. Kuulostaa hyvältä contains the reading texts, exercises and solutions to the exercises. Sounds good contains English grammar explanations for each chapter of Kuulostaa hyvältä. It also contains Finnish-English word lists and the full English translation of the main book’s dialogues.

You probably get the most out of this series if you get both books, use them side by side and also watch the videos. The fact that the grammar is explained in English is a plus. However, rather than buying both books, you could use a different source for the grammar. There isn’t anything special about the grammar in Sounds good that justifies buying the book. The Finnish-English word lists and the translated dialogues are also hardly worth the bother of tracking this book down. I’m a little bit put off by the fact that they made it two separate books to begin with. These could easily have been combined into one.

I found it’s hard to find a copy of Sounds good. My local library has several copies of Kuulostaa hyvältä, but I had to order Sounds good from a different library. Sounds good also seems to be sold out in many places, though I did find one source that still sells it.

This book is suitable for self-study because it lists the vocabulary of the reading texts in English and explains the grammar used in English. However, the approach of this book will require you to have a keen interest in Finnish grammar. This book doesn’t specifically mention what level it is for, but I’m estimating that you would need about level A2.1 if you want to use it for self-study. Having some grasp on the Finnish grammar already will make the explanations in this book easier to understand.

Each chapter starts with a reading text, which is either a fictional dialogue or a narrative. A Finnish-English vocabulary list is included. There you can find grammar and vocabulary explanations which target the words, phrases and sentence types that are present in the texts. For each interesting sentence, you can find a short explanation, and if it’s a new topic, you get referred to the back of the book where there is a more thorough explanation of the grammar topic.

For example, the text includes the sentence “Mika suoritti puutarhurin tutkinnon” in chapter 7. Immediately after the text, this sentence is explained as: “The word puutarhurin is in the genitive. In the word tutkinnon the ending n is the object marker”. The same approach is taken for the sentence “Jari opiskeli merkonomiksi” in the same chapter. The grammar of this phrase is explained immediately after the reading text as: “The word merkonomiksi has the ending ksi, which expresses change or end result. After having finished his studies to obtain the title of ‘merkonomi‘, Jari has now graduated”. The back of the book then has a half-page explanation about the translative ending -ksi in more detail.

This is a pretty unique approach, which I think analytic and grammar focused students will love. However, if your focus is more on learning vocabulary and learning to communicate, I think this book probably isn’t the best for that goal.

The exercise book contains the same topics as the textbook. It seems mostly aimed at beginning Finnish teachers who need ideas to make their lessons more practical and functional. Part of the exercises are meant to be done with a classmate, and many of them are oral exercises. The solutions to the written exercises are included in the back of the book. The textbook had a section in the back with more complete grammar explanations, and the exercise book mirrors this approach with exercises specifically about these grammar explanations in the back of the book.

There’s an attempt at instructing the reader on how to grow as a language learner by getting you used to ways to learn vocabulary, to practice grammar and to apply it to different situations. These are all things a Finnish teacher fresh out of university would need some help with figuring out. Maybe you do as well, for self-study, but I can’t assess how easy it is to implement these habits to self-study.

I suppose this book could work for self-study, but be aware that quite a lot of the exercises are meant for pairwork or to be corrected by a teacher. The books do complement each other, but you could very well use the textbook without buying this exercise book.

This book is meant for adult students of about level A2.1. Although the pictures in the book are kind of childish, the topics covered are typical for adult immigrants in Finland. For example, you get a peek into the life of a family with small children through messages from their kindergarten teacher. Typical A2 topics covered in this book are things like getting ill and calling the health center, talking about your living arrangements, neighbors, moving, ways to save money and recycling.

This book is not meant for self-study. This is clear from the fact that nearly all exercises are meant to be answered together with other students in pairs or small groups. Note that this book doesn’t contain any grammar explanations – its main idea is clearly language as a means of communication.

However, I think its contents are interesting enough for self-study if you have the right motivation. If you’re just looking to strengthen your language skills, this book is nice. You should definitely use the online materials to supplement the fairly thin course book. On this page, you can find materials meant for teachers using this book in a course. If you’re using the book for self-study, clicking the chapters listed on the left side and scrolling down will reveal the solutions to the exercises in the book. In addition, on the right side, where it says “äänitteet“, you can listen to the texts in the book. Important to note about the audio is that each chapter is listed twice in the list, both as kirjakielinen “book language” and puhekielinen “spoken language”. This means you can listen to both and try to detect the differences.

Just like the first part of this series, Palataan is focused on real, everyday situations an immigrant in Finland could be confronted with. Topics touched upon are, for example, related with getting a phone connection, paying taxes, voting, volunteering and group sports.

Each chapter in Palataan! has many listening exercises, some of which have been printed in the book, and others which you can find online. The latter are meant to be listened to without looking at the text first. The exercises in each chapter are conversation prompts, which generally are meant to let you discuss real life issues with another student.

The first book of this series didn’t contain any grammar explanations. The second book contains a small number of grammar explanations as well as some exercises.  These exercises are often the type where, for example, you’re presented with a sentence like Kalastaminen on hauskaa. The assignment is to make that sentence into Minä pidän and Minä harrastan type sentences together with a classmate. There are also a small number of actual fill-in-the-gap exercises for verb forms and cases. None of the grammar is looked at in great detail, but you have the internet full of other resources which you could turn to for that.

Palataan includes grammar topics such as the verbtypes, the partitive, genitive and location cases, the third and fourth infinitive, the imperative, passive, past passive and comparatives. As such, it covers the A2.1 grammar topics that the first book would have included as well as typical A2.2 topics.

Just like the first book, Palataan has not been designed for self-study. Most of the exercises are communicative, so they require you to have someone to talk to. However, the listening exercises are available for free online and you can find the solutions to most of the exercises in the teacher’s guide. I feel the right student could get a lot out of this book.

The first book of this series covers the A2.1-A2.2 topics that are generally present in modern course books. There is, for example, a chapter on hobbies and another on finding and moving into a new home. When it comes to grammar, Työelämän suomea 1 also covers what is traditionally included in A2.1 and A2.2 level course books. You can study the imperfect and perfect tense, the conditional, passive, third infinitive, joka-pronoun, object and the plural cases (plural partitive, genitive and location cases). The grammar is explained clearly and presented in nice tables and sections.

In addition to regular everyday topics, this book contains lots of sections related to studying and working in Finland. The main characters in the book apply for vocational training, search for an internship at a car repair garage, write CVs and go to a job interview. Each chapter gives you a look at vocabulary related to a specific profession (e.g. welder, IT worker, hairdresser, car mechanic), with words which are also useful in everyday life. Due to the focus on working life, you might not find this book very attractive, but it does include a lot of essential everyday vocabulary and phrases as well.

Each chapter starts with a reading text, which can be either a dialogue or (more often) a narrative. The dialogues contain important spoken language features. The grammar is explained in sections which stand out from the rest of the chapter. There are plenty of exercises included, which allow you to practice both the grammar and the vocabulary of the chapter. Many of the exercises are specifically related to the reading text.

The audio of Työelämän suomea 1 comes in two versions. There’s a limited, cheaper version for students, which contains a recorded version of the reading texts in the book. The complete version for teachers also includes all the listening exercises of the book. There’s also a teacher’s guide available, which contains ideas for group assignments and some easier/harder versions of most listening exercises. I wouldn’t invest in the teacher’s guide for self-study.

Työelämän suomea 1 is first and foremost meant as a course book. As such, it doesn’t include the solutions to the exercises. Many of the exercises encourage you to create your own sentences, which should then be corrected by the teacher. There are many exercises that require you to discuss things or practice the grammar with a partner or in small groups. I don’t think this book is especially suitable for self-study.

The second book of the Työelämän suomea series is very focused on working life. Each chapter covers part of the journey towards getting a job in Finland. Included are topics such as how to talk about your educational and professional history, how to write a CV and job application letter, how to look for a job, and how to conduct yourself in a job interview. It also includes several chapters related to actually being at work in Finland, such as how to get to know your colleagues, how to answer the phone, how to deal with customers and what to do or say in meetings.

The grammar in this book is heavily tied to its function in certain situations. This is a very nice approach. For example, the essive and translative are addressed in the context of describing your educational and professional history (e.g. Olen työskennellyt myyjänä, Valmistuin insinööriksi vuonna 2008). Likewise, the topics relating to giving instructions, advice or feedback allow you to practice the imperative, conditional and passive conditional (Varaattehan ajan puhelimitse. Tulisitko hetkeksi tänne? Hoidettaisiinko asia saman tien?). The book contains an incredible amount of useful phrases, both for the workplace and for everyday functions of language such as expressing your emotions, asking for clarification, responding to negative feedback, making suggestions, as well as expressing agreement and disagreement.

I wouldn’t recommend the second book of this series for self-study either. Just like the first book, Työelämän suomea 2 is first and foremost meant as a course book. Many of the exercises require either assistance from a teacher or communication with other students. The topics also aren’t especially inspiring to study on your own. One positive note for this book is that (unlike part one) the answers to the exercises are included in the back. If you do decide to use this book, I suggest you skip the first chapter. It’s little more than a complicated introduction to the whole book.

This book is part of the Harjoitus tekee mestarin series, which is meant to prepare students for the YKI-test. The first book concentrates on the conjugation of verbs and the inflection of nouns, mainly through the medium of fill-in-the-gap exercises. Each chapter starts with a couple of tables or lists explaining the grammar topic, and then gives you exercises to practice that topic. If your goal is to practice all tenses (imperfect, plusquamperfect, etc.) and moods (conditional, potential, etc.) as well as inflecting words in the Finnish cases (illative, partitive, translative, etc.), this book is great.

In addition, for the right learner, this book can be so much more than just a grammar exercise book. While this book doesn’t contain any vocabulary exercises as such, many of the grammar exercises require you to pick the right word out of a list for each sentence. The vocabulary used in the grammar exercises is perfect for students who wish to get to level B1.1.

The solutions to this book’s exercises can be found online, though there doesn’t seem to be a version of this PDF file on Art House’s website itself. I consider this book very good for students that require a revision of key grammar subjects. This book is suitable for self-study.

This book is part of the Harjoitus tekee mestarin series, which is meant to prepare students for the YKI-test. While the first book focuses on the conjugation and inflection of words, this second book focuses on constructions: how to form and connect sentences. This book contains a lot of grammar elements that will be found in newspaper articles and such. In fact, the book is very focused on constructions that are typical especially for written Finnish, such as rare cases (abessive, comitative, instructive, etc.) participles, participle constructions (temporaalirakenne, on mentävä, etc.), the relative joka-pronoun and other complex sentence types.

This is an exercise book, with almost exclusively fill-in-the-gaps exercises. Each topic is introduced in a very condensed way, after which you can practice it. The aim of this book is not to teach you the topics it allows you to practice. Its premise is that the learner has studied the theory of the exercises elsewhere already. You will need to use additional sources to find your way through the exercises provided. The book itself doesn’t contain the solutions to the exercises, but you can find them online. Even with the solutions provided, you will have to work hard in order to make sense of the sentences used. Studying the advanced vocabulary used in these exercises will also further boost your Finnish level.

The introduction mentions that – for keskitaso (B1-level) – it’s enough to be able to passively understand the constructions provided in the book. However, learners that want to participate in the language test for the highest proficiency level would benefit from learning to actively use these constructions in their own texts.

This book is part of a series meant to prepare students for the YKI-test. In contrast with books 1 and 2, this book’s main focus is on vocabulary. It focuses on the derivation of words: how to, for example, make verbs into nouns, or nouns into adjectives. It also takes a look at synonyms and antonyms, and how compound words are created in Finnish.

This is an exercise book, with almost exclusively fill-in-the-gaps exercises. It gives you the basics of how the words are derived from other words and then lets you explore it through exercises. It’s a good idea to look at the example sentences from a grammar point of view, as they will follow a certain pattern that would be good to learn as well even though this book doesn’t have any grammar explanations.

The book itself doesn’t contain the solutions to the exercises, but you can find them online. Even with the solutions provided, you will have to work hard in order to make sense of the sentences used.

This book is part of a series meant to prepare students for the YKI-test. The fourth part includes reading exercises as well as exercises meant to develop your vocabulary and ability to form sentences. The solutions to the exercises are included in the back of the book.

The first sort of exercises included in this book are reading comprehension exercises. These mirror the types that appear in the YKI-test: each text comes with either true-or-false, multiple choice or short answer exercises. There are also some fill-in-the-gaps exercises that require you to rephrase the text in different ways.

There are also several types of vocabulary exercises. There are exercises where you have to pick the right synonym, word or form for a given sentence from three options. Sometimes vocabulary and grammar exercises are combined: some exercises require you to inflect nouns or conjugate verbs into the spaces in the sentences. Things you get to practice in these include: rections, conjunctions, infinitives and similar-looking words and synonyms. This book doesn’t contain any explanations for the grammar required to solve the exercises.

Finally, there is also a section to help practice writing skills. Unfortunately, it seems many students don’t find open-ended writing assignments like this very useful. I understand that you would like to have someone give you feedback on your writing, but even writing just for the sake of writing can help develop your written skills. That said, the writing assignments listed in this book are very suitable to practice writing for the YKI-test.

Be advised that it will take a motivated student to get the most out of these exercises. While it’s great that the answers are included, researching the reason for the correct solution can be tricky. This is especially true for the grammar-related exercises. If you have a Finnish teacher available to guide you to the right grammar topics, you’ll get the most out of these. If not, the contents of this book are still valuable and will help you improve your Finnish even to level B2. Just don’t rush through them!

This book isn’t meant as a book to teach you Finnish grammar. The explanations are short: they are clearly meant as a reminder of the grammar before you get to practicing it. This book could work well as an additional resource to practice the grammar of topics you’re learning in a course or from another book.

The first book of the Suomen kieli kuntoon series starts with a section on the phonology of Finnish: short and long sounds and how the use of these will create words with different meanings. Then it moves on to the morphology of Finnish: the T-plural, genitive and partitive cases, as well as the verbtypes, the imperfect, perfect and plusquamperfect. There is a section about the different types of pronouns, such as demonstrative and relative pronouns, and about the derivation of words. Last but not least, it contains exercises about the syntax of Finnish sentences: the cases used for the object and the complement and the most common sentence types (e.g. necessity sentences, existential sentences, generic sentences and sentences without a subject).

Each section in the book comes with a page or two displaying the rules of the topic addressed, after which you can find various exercises to practice those rules. Many of the exercises contain the required words in a list, with spaces in the exercise to fill in. This forces you to also understand the sentence rather than just the grammar. Some exercises are simple fill-in-the-gaps exercises and others require you to write full sentences.

The solutions to the exercises in Suomen kieli kuntoon used to be available online. I sent the publisher an email and they seem to be permanently gone. Such a loss.

I’m very sad that the Suomen kieli kuntoon series is no longer getting printed. I hope your local Finnish libraries still have it. This book is the second part of the series, which I consider much more useful than the first.

This wonderful book allows advanced learners of Finnish to challenge themselves to learn more phrases, sayings and sentence constructions. Suomen kieli kuntoon 2 covers some vocabulary topics that I’ve also covered on Uusi kielemme, such as missä phrases (e.g. piilossa, näkyvissä, tukossa) and millä phrases (e.g. levällään, ammollaan, sukkasillaan).

In addition, Suomi kieli kuntoon 2 gives you the chance to practice conjugation (conditional, imperative, potential), inflection (all the cases, including the instructive and abessive), particles (e.g. clitics, postpositions and conjunctions) and advanced grammar topics such as the participle constructions. The neat thing about this book is that each exercise has a double function: whilst most of the book is organized by grammar topic, it contains vocabulary even a B2-level student could learn from.

Each new section starts with a page or two displaying the rules of the topic addressed, after which you can find various exercises to practice those rules. Many of the exercises contain the required words in a list, with spaces in the exercise to fill in. This forces you to also understand the sentence rather than just the grammar. Some exercises are simple fill-in-the-gaps exercises and others require you to write full sentences.

The solutions to the exercises in Suomen kieli kuntoon used to be available online. I sent the publisher an email and they seem to be permanently gone. Such a loss.

The Juttuja ja tuttuja books follow the lives of a multicultural class of seventh graders (13-year olds). The idea is that all of them recently moved to Finland. They’ve been given a show and tell assignment and each chapter presents the story related to the object they brought. The book contains both information about Finnish culture and the culture of the students (e.g. of Somalia and Vietnam). Because the book is mainly meant for 13-year olds, the objects are mainly related to their hobbies and personal lives.

Each chapter contains a narrative, which is accompanied by a vocabulary list and reading comprehension questions. There are also related conversation prompts and assignments to research a topic and write a paper or presentation about it.

Spoken language is included in diary entries and emails. The main character of each chapter writes either a journal entry or an email in which spoken language is used. In addition to mä, mun and mulla, you also get other spoken language differences, such as phonological and syntactical differences.

This book is not necessarily meant for self-study, because many of the exercises are conversation prompts. However, it also includes many writing assignments, which could work for self-study. It’s important to realize that you don’t always need someone to correct your writings. Just the act of writing and trying to find the right words is already good practice. A motivated student could get a lot out of this book. However, this book is no longer being printed.

This grammar and exercise book is very loosely related to the course book (see above) in the sense that it contains the same pictures and is appropriate for about the same level. Other than that, they have very little in common. Don’t expect these two books to match!

The exercise book shows more clearly than the course book that it is meant especially as a second language course book. It’s meant to teach the same things that would be included in a parallel Finnish for native speakers class. The book assumes that the 13-year-old using it has a decent grasp of the language already.

The harjoituskirja doesn’t shy away from grammar terms that would be taught in the native class. It goes both over the different word types (e.g. what numerals, pronouns and adverbs are and how to use them) and morphology (e.g. the different tenses as well as the inessive, abessive and other cases). Attention is also paid to the usage of punctuation and capital letters.

Every grammar topic gets presented in a concise table, which might not immediately be helpful if you’re using this book for self-study. There are additional tables displaying the grammar in the back of the book. The grammar is mainly focused on the cases (e.g. genitive, inessive, instructive). It gives a fairly limited overview of all tenses. You can also learn a little about numerals, pronouns and postpositions.

Every topic contains a few exercises where you’re instructed to find examples of the topic in sentences that have been provided. Then, there are a couple of exercises where you use this topic for single words, after which you get other exercises where you’re supposed to make full sentences. The vocabulary of the sentences in the exercises is about level A2.2-B1.1.

You obviously don’t have to be 13 to use this book because grammar isn’t different at age 13 than at 48. However, I wouldn’t recommend this book for self-study. It’s no longer available for sale and it’s not that easy to find in libraries. The grammar isn’t explained in much detail and the exercises are pretty simple and limited. In addition, the answers to the exercises aren’t included in the back of the book.

Yhteistä ja omaa is the second part of a series of books for middle school students. The first part, called Juttuja ja tuttuja, is aimed at youths in seventh grade (about 13 years old). Yhteistä ja omaa is meant for eighth graders, and the third part of the series (Täällä  ja toisaalla) is meant for ninth graders (15 year olds).

Yhteistä ja omaa is a very pleasant book to leaf through because the font has been kept pretty large and there are plenty of drawings on the pages.

The reading texts in the book follow the lives of a multicultural grade 8 class. It contains texts about how they deal with the world, find out what they like and what they are passionate about. Spoken language is included in diary entries and emails. The main character of each chapter writes either a journal entry or an email in which spoken language is used. In addition to mä, mun and mulla, you also get other spoken language differences, such as phonological and syntactical differences.

Yhteistä ja omaa used to have an exercise book accompanying it, but I’ve been unable to lay my hands on it. Much like this whole series, you could possibly find it in your local library.

Täällä ja toisaalla is a reading comprehension book which follows the lives of a group of multicultural youths, ninth graders (so, students who will soon be off to Finnish high school, about 15 years of age). It’s a very pleasant book to leaf through because the font has been kept pretty large and there are plenty of colorful drawings on the pages.

The texts in this book are at about level B1.2 and include many subjects important to studies after middle school. For example, you have several chapters about Finnish literature (Aleksis Kivi, Elias Lönnrot, Minna Canth), history and society. In addition, it also includes topics such as how to write term papers, job applications and summaries. Last but not least, this book also covers spoken dialects in the form of diary entries: the characters in this book write in spoken language in their diaries.

Each chapter in Täällä ja toisaalla comes with vocabulary lists of the most important vocabulary used in the texts (generally pretty abstract terms). The book also includes some conversation and writing assignment prompts after each text. It doesn’t contain any exercises, and there are rarely any listening comprehension questions either. The level of the reading texts stays at about the same B1.2 level.

There used to be an exercise book accompanying this reader, but it’s not available for sale anymore. My local library doesn’t have it either, so I can’t tell you whether it’s worth hunting down.

If you want an easy book to read, this reader with simplified language (selkokieli) is pretty nice for beginners. It starts around level A1.3 and goes up to a solid level A2.2. It’s a very inviting book to look at, with a lot of drawn pictures and a large font.

The reading texts in the book follow the lives of a multicultural grade 7 class. There are texts about their friendship, free time, hobbies and school. Each student of the multicultural class brings something to school that’s important to them and presents it to the class. You can learn some tidbits about Finnish culture, but there is a lot of information about other cultures as well (e.g. Somalia, Vietnam).

Spoken language is included in diary entries and emails. The main character of each chapter writes either a journal entry or an email in which spoken language is used. In addition to mä, mun and mulla, you also get other spoken language differences, such as phonological and syntactical differences.

This book is no longer being printed, but perhaps your local Finnish library has it. It’s likely to be on the selkokieli shelf rather than with Finnish learning textbooks.

There are two other books with almost the same name (Juttuja ja tuttuja), one of which is a textbook and the other an exercise book. The level of these other two books doesn’t match up with the reader, so don’t invest in all three with the expectation that they complement each other! They do contain the same topics in each chapter, but the level difference is stark.

There are three books in the Samalla kartalla series. Part 1 contains reading texts meant to help leaners get from level A2.2 up to B1.1. The texts in the beginning of the book are more suitable for A2.2, while further along in the book the difficulty of the grammar and vocabulary increase. The topics get more abstract as you go along. In addition, every chapter contains some harder and some easier texts, while still fitting the gradual increase.

Samalla kartalla 1 is divided into seven main chapters, each of which contain multiple articles relating to a theme. The texts are related to everyday life topics such as family, traveling, consumption, hobbies, working life and Finnish culture. Having several articles around one theme is especially nice because it gives you the opportunity to see vocabulary and grammar related to the same topic used in different ways. Each chapter advances from easier texts to harder ones. The text types in this book include narrative texts, opinion pieces and dialogues.

The reading texts in Samalla kartalla 1 are accompanied by reading comprehension exercises, which can be open-ended questions, true-or-false or multiple choice. Also included are prompts to get you thinking about your own experiences or opinions, which you can use to, for example, write your own texts on the topic. The answers to the exercises are included in the back of the book.

In the table of contents, each chapter also comes with a mention of which grammar topics will be especially present in it. However, the actual chapters don’t explain those grammar topics nor highlight them in any way. Topics mentioned are, for example, the imperfect tense in chapter 1, the superlative of adjectives in chapter 3 and the essive and translative cases in chapter 6.

In the back of the book, you can also find a small number of sentence construction and vocabulary exercises. These exercises are at about the level B1.1, so they’re most suitable for when you’ve worked your way through the whole book. If you also buy Samalla kartalla 3, you can practice additional vocabulary and grammar related to the topics in books 1 and 2.

This book is the follow-up to Samalla kartalla 1 and follows exactly the same pattern. Each chapter is centered around a certain theme, with multiple reading texts related to it. The texts in Samalla kartalla 2 are more abstract than in part 1. Included are things like issues in social life, the influence of media on our lives, ways to be active in Finnish society, and how to influence climate change.

Each text comes with some reading comprehension questions (multiple choice, true-or-false, open questions). Most chapters contain at least one exercise which allows you to practice the vocabulary of the texts. Each chapter also includes at least one question list, which could be used as a prompt for writing your own texts. The answers to the exercises are included in the back of the book.

Also in the back of the book you can find a small number of sentence construction, derivation and rection exercises. These exercises are at about the level B2, so they’re most suitable for when you’ve worked your way through the whole book. If you also buy Samalla kartalla 3, you can practice additional vocabulary and grammar related to the topics of book 1 and 2.

This book differs drastically from Samalla kartalla 1 and 2! It does not contain more advanced reading comprehension exercises. Instead, it’s meant be used in combination with (or after) the previous books in order to improve your vocabulary and grammar skills.

All the topics from book 1 and 2 have their own chapter in Samalla kartalla 3, where you can practice related vocabulary. These exercises allow you to learn synonyms for basic words you already know (e.g. kodikas and viihtyisä), as well as broadening your vocabulary with related words (e.g. parveke, terassi, kuisti) and providing you with close-meaning words and verbs. The familiar topics from books 1 and 2 include: family, traveling, health, Finnish society, nature and media. There are a lot of fill-in-the-gap and multiple-choice exercises, as well as “connect the synonyms/antonyms” etc.

The vocabulary goes hand in hand with the grammar in this book. While studying new words, you are also tasked with putting these words in the correct sentence and in the right form. You get to practice all kinds of grammar: the imperfect, passive, third infinitive, plural partitive, etc. The answers to the exercises are included in the back of the book.