During this semester, you will write compositions in German.  German has four characters that the English alphabet doesn’t.

Ä ä               Ö ö                    Ü ü                   ß

In order to type your compositions on a computer, you can do one of two things:

Use the German keyboard, rather than the English keyboard, by figuring out how to switch the keyboard settings on your computer or learn the codes for the special characters, for either Windows or Mac.

About.com has a nice explanation of how to type German characters with an English-language keyboard.  Go here:  Special Character Chart for German.