Aller – Near Future
You can explain what will happen in the near future with the construction aller + infinitive; for example, L'avion va atterrir ici - "The plane is going to land here." tenses moods voices
French Verb Tenses | Moods | Voices
Temps | Modes | Voix
Lessons on present, past, future | indicative, subjunctive, imperative } active, passive, reflexive …
You can explain what will happen in the near future with the construction aller + infinitive; for example, L'avion va atterrir ici - "The plane is going to land here." A1 - Beginning French • tenses moods voices
Auxiliary Verbs – Avoir vs Être
Auxiliary verbs are also known as helping verbs, because they help form compound conjugations. The key thing to remember about compound conjugations is that it's the auxiliary verb which conjugates for the required tense or mood; the main verb is always a past participle. A2 - Low-Intermediate French • conjugation lessons • lesson plans • tenses moods voices
Avoiding the Subjunctive
Although the subjunctive is commonly used in French, there are numerous ways to avoid it, with varying meaning changes. (This doesn't mean you don't need to know how to use the subjunctive, just that there are times when an alternative is acceptable.) B2 - Upper-Intermediate French • tenses moods voices
Chanson du subjonctif
B1 - Intermediate French • tenses moods voices
Compound Modal Verbs
Compound modal verbs express perfect (in the grammatical sense of "completed") actions. These English constructions consist of a modal verb + have + past participle, while the French equivalent is usually a verb in a perfect tense or mood plus an infinitive. Conditional Mood
In English, we use the modal "would" plus a verb to talk about actions that may or may not take place, usually depending on whether a certain condition is met. The French equivalent to this construction is a conditional mood with a full set of conjugations for every verb. The uses of these two constructions are very similar. A2 - Low-Intermediate French • tenses moods voices
Conditional Perfect
To talk about something that would, could, or should have happened—but didn't—you need the conditional perfect, also known as the past conditional. B1 - Intermediate French • tenses moods voices
Conditional Perfect, Second Form
The second form of the conditional perfect suffers from something of an identity crisis: it looks like the pluperfect subjunctive but has the value of the conditional perfect. The second form of the past conditional is used mostly in si clauses and is a literary tense, so is found only in very formal written French. conjugation lessons • formalities • tenses moods voices
Future Perfect
Wouldn't it be nice if you could plan a perfect future? Too bad that's not what the future perfect tense does. The grammatical term "perfect" means "completed," so the future perfect is used to talk about something that will have happened or will have been completed at some point in the future. B1 - Intermediate French • tenses moods voices
Future Tense
In English, we use the modal "will" plus a verb to talk about actions that will take place in the future, but in French there's a future tense with a full set of conjugations for every verb. The uses of these two constructions are very similar. A2 - Low-Intermediate French • lesson plans • tenses moods voices
Historical Tenses
When writing about history, the tenses used in French and English aren't always the same. French prefers to use the present or even the future, while English tends to favor the past tense. Idiomatic Pronominal Verbs
Some French verbs use a reflexive pronoun to create a meaning different from (though often related to) the meaning of their non-pronominal siblings. B2 - Upper-Intermediate French • tenses moods voices
Imparfait vs Passé composé
Knowing whether to use the passé composé or imparfait is particularly difficult when translating certain verbs into French. Very broadly speaking, the imperfect is equivalent to was/were + ___ing, but some English verbs are not often used in this form. So when translating was, had, and liked into French, you have to think about the meaning in order to decide which tense to use. Imperative Mood
It's imperative to understand the imperative mood if you want to give orders, make requests, express desires, provide recommendations, offer advice, and prohibit actions. A2 - Low-Intermediate French • tenses moods voices • word order
Imperfect
They say practice makes perfect, so how can one of the most common French past tenses be imperfect? In grammatical terms, "perfect" means "complete," so the imperfect tense is used to describe an incomplete or ongoing action or state of being. A2 - Low-Intermediate French • lesson plans • tenses moods voices
Unlike other French suffixes, -ci does not create new words, but rather adds additional meaning to the nouns and pronouns it's attached to.
