Salut !
Learning French grammar, which is crucial for fluency, can feel like solving a never-ending puzzle, but today, we’re making it simple. In less than 20 minutes, you’ll have a solid foundation in French grammar to start creating sentences and communicating with more confidence. We’ll cover nouns, verbs, tenses, pronouns, adjectives… Let’s get started!
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Watch the full video lesson on our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@Commeunefrancaise
1) Foundations: Gender, nouns, and adjectives
French nouns have genders: masculine or feminine. There is no rule that you can learn to make sure you never make mistakes. You need to learn nouns with their article.
- Masculine: le croissant, un garçon, le café, le métro, un restaurant.
- Feminine: la baguette, une fille, la pizza, la musique, une photo.
The gender of French nouns mostly changes their articles: le / la, un / une.
We say “la fille” for the girl, and “le garçon” for the boy.
We say “un homme” for a man, and “une femme” for a woman.
Plurals are straightforward, it’s the same form for both genders: les and des.
- Les (the): les cafés (the coffees), les photos (the photos)
- Des (some): des femmes (“some” women), des garçons (“some” boys)
Gender also impacts our adjectives, they change to match the noun’s gender and number:
- Un garçon intelligent = a smart boy
- Une fille intelligente = a smart girl
An adjective in a masculine form with a masculine noun:
Grand (tall) / Petit (small) / Vert (green) / Rouge (red) / Beau (handsome)
An adjective in a feminine form* with a feminine noun:
Grande (tall) / Petite (small) / Verte (green) / Rouge (red) (if there’s already an “e” at the end, it stays the same) / Belle (beautiful) (many adjectives are irregular).
*In French, to form a feminine adjective, you often only need to add an “e” at the end, but there are some exceptions, too.
- fort / forte (= strong) – (add an “e” for the feminine)
- incroyable / incroyable (= incredible) – (already an “e” in the masculine)
- heureux / heureuse (= happy) – (a silent “x” often turns to “se” in the feminine)
Adjectives mostly go after nouns in French: un garçon intelligent, un jambon vert (= a green ham). The main exceptions are the BAGS adjectives: Beauty, Age, Goodness, Size.
- Beauty: Un beau garçon = a handsome boy
- Age: Une vieille maison = an old house
- Goodness: Un bon jambon = a good ham
- Size: Un petit pied = a small foot
In French, when masculine and feminine nouns are together, then the group is considered masculine: Des garçons et des filles intéressants = Interesting boys and girls.
This particular rule, about the masculine plural of mixed-gender groups, has gotten some interesting discussions in recent years. Some groups have been exploring alternative ways to handle this grammar point, mostly in feminist circles.
2) Creating sentences: Pronouns, verbs, and putting it all together rted
Pronouns replace nouns. There are different kinds of pronouns; let’s see the subject pronoun:
– Je (I), tu (you), il/elle (he/she), nous (we), vous (you, formal/plural), ils/elles (they, masculine/feminine).
– On, the informal “we”, but grammatically in the third person. I made a whole video about “On” in everyday modern French: Modern Spoken French: How to Use “On” – Comme une Française
The genders follow us here too. When we talk about le café (masculine), we say “il” (he). When we talk about la pizza (feminine), we say “elle” (she).
- Le café ? Il est chaud. = The coffee? It’s hot.
- La pizza ? Elle est chaude. = The pizza? It’s hot.
Unlike in English, French verbs change their ending depending on who’s doing the action.
The verb “être” (= to be): Je suis (I am), Tu es (You are), Il/elle est (He/she is), Nous sommes (We are), Vous êtes (You are), Ils/elles sont (They are).
Most verbs follow a much simpler pattern. Regular “-er” verbs like danser (to dance) follow predictable patterns: -e (silent), -es (silent s), -e, -ons (nasal sound, silent “s”), -ez (“é” sound, silent z), -ent (silent).
Danser (= to dance): Je danse, Tu danses, Il/elle danse, Nous dansons, Vous dansez, Ils/elles dansent.
Many of these endings sound exactly the same. Only “nous” and “vous” are different, and in informal French, we use the third person “on” instead of “nous”: “on danse.”
Aimer (= to like, to love): J’aime, Tu aimes, Il/elle aime, Nous aimons, Vous aimez, Ils/elles aiment.
If a verb starts with a vowel, there are some things that change:
– Je becomes j’ → it’s j’aime and not je aime.
– The silent “s” at the end of “nous”, “vous”, and the plural “ils / elles” now sounds like a “z”. (Nous zaimons, vous zaimez, elles zaiment). That’s called “la liaison”, and I also made a whole free lesson on this trap of French pronunciation: How to Use ‘La Liaison’ Properly (Rules + Examples).
Let’s make our first complete sentences!
- Tu es intelligent. (You are smart.)
- Je suis une femme. (I am a woman.)
- Elle aime le jambon. (She likes ham!)
Then you can learn some adverbs to place after the verb, like: bien = well, beaucoup (eau = o + silent “p” at the end) = a lot, souvent = often…
- You dance well. = Tu danses bien. (to a friend, singular)
- He likes to dance. = Il aime danser. (with the infinitive form)
- The girls and the boys are happy. = Les filles et les garçons sont heureux. (masculine plural)
Questions and negations in everyday spoken French
– Understand Fast Spoken French: Questions Aren’t Obvious
– Spoken French Practice: Drop the “ne” + improve your fluency
You don’t need to learn the structures like “Est-ce qu’il danse bien ?” or “Danse-t-il bien ?” or the formal negations “Il ne danse pas bien” or “Tu n’aimes pas le jambon”. In spoken French, keeping it casual is key. Skip the formal rules for now.
For questions: Use your normal sentence with a rising intonation at the end: Tu aimes danser ? (Do you like dancing?)
For negations: Add “pas” after the verb, drop the “ne”: Il danse pas bien. (He doesn’t dance well.)
3) Time to talk about time: Past and Future tenses
For the past, we mainly use two tenses in spoken French:
- Le passé composé (for completed actions)
- L’imparfait (for ongoing situations or habits in the past)
Le passé composé is made of two parts, like the present perfect in English (“I have done”).
- The verb “avoir” (or sometimes “être”) in the present
- The past participle of your main verb
The verb “avoir” (= to have) is an irregular verb, but you need to learn it by heart, at least in the present. It’s: J’ai (= I have), Tu as (= You have), Il/elle a (= He/she has), Nous avons (= We have), Vous avez (= You have), Ils/elles ont (= They have).
The past participle for the verbs in -er” like “danser” is pretty simple: take off the “-er”, and add “-é” and that’s it! You get “dansé”.
Danser: j’ai dansé, tu as dansé, il/elle a dansé, nous avons dansé, vous avez dansé, ils/elles ont dansé.
– She danced well. = Elle a bien dansé.
– Did they like it? = Ils ont aimé ? or Elles ont aimé ? (if there’s no man)
Some verbs use “être” as the auxiliary verb. The main ones are verbs of movement like:
– aller (to go) → je suis allé(e) (= I went)
– venir (to come) → tu es venu(e) (= you came)
– partir (to leave) → elle est partie (= she left)
With “être”, the past participle agrees with the gender of the subject. That’s not the case with “avoir.” I won’t cover the exceptions today. Anyway, most of the time it sounds the same.
L’imparfait is different. We use it to describe situations that were ongoing in the past. You build the imparfait by picking a verb in the present, take the “nous” form (dansons), drop the -ons, and add: -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient.
Danser → nous dansons → Je dansais, Tu dansais, Elle dansait, Vous dansiez, Nous dansions, Elles dansaient.
– We were dancing. = Nous dansions or On dansait.
– The house was big. = La maison était grande.
Often, we use imparfait and passé composé together, to tell a story. “L’imparfait” is a situation, while “le passé composé” is an event. For instance: “Il pleuvait (imparfait) quand je suis sortie (passé composé).” (It was raining when I went out.)
Le futur – There’s a real future tense, but in everyday French, we often use what we call the “near future” which is simpler: aller (to go) in the present + infinitive (I’m going to + verb).
Aller (= to go) in the present tense: Je vais, Tu vas, Elle va, Nous allons, Vous allez, Ils vont.
Danser: Je vais danser (= I’m going to dance. Or simply: I’ll dance.), Tu vas danser, Elle va danser, Nous allons danser, Vous allez danser, Elles vont danser.
- Juliette is happy. → Juliette est heureuse.
- She danced a lot. → Elle a beaucoup dansé.
- She will love Paris. → Elle va aimer Paris.
Bravo!
Allez, à plus!
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