Category: French grammar tips

The subjunctive mood is used in French to express doubt, emotion, necessity, or uncertainty. For example, in ‘Il faut que tu viennes’ (You must come), ‘viennes’ is in the subjunctive…

French grammar tip: The Subjunctive Mood in French The subjunctive mood is used in French to express doubt, emotion, necessity, or uncertainty. For example, in ‘Il faut que tu viennes’…

Reflexive verbs in French are used when the subject and the object of the verb are the same. For example, ‘se laver’ means ‘to wash oneself’. Reflexive verbs often require…

‘Savoir’ means ‘to know’ in the sense of knowledge or information, while ‘connaître’ means ‘to know’ in terms of being familiar with someone or something. For example, ‘Je sais la…

‘Y’ is a pronoun in French that often replaces a prepositional phrase indicating a place or a thing introduced by ‘à’. For instance, ‘Je vais à Paris’ becomes ‘J’y vais’…

The partitive article (‘du’, ‘de la’, ‘de l’’) is used in French to express an unspecified quantity, similar to ‘some’ in English. For example, ‘du vin’ means ‘some wine’. L’article…

‘Est-ce que’ is a common way to form questions in French. For example, ‘Est-ce que tu viens?’ means ‘Are you coming?’. It’s a versatile structure that can be used in…

‘De’ is used to indicate possession or origin, like ‘le livre de Marie’ (Marie’s book). ‘Du’ is the contraction of ‘de le’ and is used with masculine singular nouns, such…

Accents in French, like the acute (é) or grave (è), can change the meaning of words. For example, ‘é’ in ‘café’ is different from ‘è’ in ‘père’ (father). Accents are…

French negation typically involves two parts: ‘ne’ and ‘pas’. For example, ‘je ne sais pas’ means ‘I don’t know’. The ‘ne’ comes before the verb, and ‘pas’ follows it. La…

‘Bon’ means ‘good’ and is an adjective, while ‘bien’ means ‘well’ and is an adverb. Use ‘bon’ with nouns, as in ‘un bon repas’ (a good meal), and ‘bien’ with…

‘Avoir’ (to have) is used in many French expressions, such as ‘avoir faim’ (to be hungry) or ‘avoir raison’ (to be right). These are different from English, where ‘to be’…