German is easy for English speakers to learn.
My name is Brett fitzpatrick and I am the English speaking half of Spiral Cat Translations. Ok, it's not easy to learn German, but it isn't as bad as you probably think.
After just six months I was reading a 482 page huge science fiction novel. (understanding well over 70% with the help of an electronic translating dictionary)
The lessons I have learned about what is important in learning a language and what isn't were eye opening.
I have been in contact with German for almost 10 years but until recently I made no progress in learning the language because like most English speakers I saw language learning as hard.
Simply reading a little every day has allowed me to learn my first language.
I now want to use the same method to learn Italian.
I have put together a list of what I think is important in language learning and it is here at this
link.
The most important lesson I learned was the order in which a language must be learned. First vocab, just read and look up the words, (usually an ordinary dictionary will have only 20% of the words you need so get an electronic dictionary) Start with comic books to get visual clues about what you are reading. To begin with you will need to look up every word you read, over and over. You will pick up a bit of the basic grammar as you do this, then a couple of months later when you are starting to understand about 60% of what you read listen mp3 with the language spoken and keep at it. Only then start to read about that complex beast called grammar that lies beneath what you already know.
This is exactly the opposite of the way most language cources teach a language. They start with the grammar when you don't even know the word for "chip shop". Crazy. Of course do a language course, but only later, when you're ready.