Lesson 10 : Grammar, the past and vocabulary
In the grammar part of the lesson 10, I’ll explain the French expression “il y a” which is very used in this language. Then we’ll begin to learn past tense and we finally see time vocabulary. Are you ready? Let’s go!
GRAMMAR : IL Y A ….
1. the French expression il y a means “there is” or “there are”
It is one of the most important expressions in the French language. It’s usually followed by an indefinite article + noun, a number + noun, or an indefinite pronoun.
Il y a des gens là-bas. There are some people over there.
Il y a un chien dans le jardin. There’s a dog in the garden.
Il y a 2 choses à faire. There are 2 things to do.
2. Il y a can also be followed by a period of time to mean “ago”
J’ai vu mes parents il y a trois semaines. I saw my parents three weeks ago.
Il y a 5 ans que nous avons quitté la France. We left France two years ago.
3. Ask a question with il y a using “est-ce que” or an inversion
Like we learnt in the previous lesson
Ask a question starting with “est-ce que”:
Est-ce qu‘il y a un chien méchant ? Is there a vicious dog?
Est-ce qu‘il y a des enfants dans le jardin ? Are there any kids in the garden?
Ask a question with an inversion :
How to process with an inversion:
1. first, put y at the beginning of your interrogative sentence.
2. invert il and a
3. place -t- between il and a :
Y a-t-il un chien dans le jardin ? Is there a dog in the garden?
Y a-t-il des enfants ?
Are there any kids?
Of course, you can use il y a with the interrogative words we learnt in lesson 9:
Pourquoi est-ce qu’il y a un chien sur mon lit ? Why is there a dog in my bed?
Combien d’enfants y a-t-il dans le jardin ? How many kids are in the garden?
CONJUGATION : PAST TENSE
The 4 most common past tenses in French are :
- Passé composé
- passé simple
- imparfait
- plus-que-parfait
Let’s start today with the passé composé
The “passé composé”
It is a compound tense which means it has 2 parts.
- The first is the auxiliary verb : avoir or être (verbs you should know very well)
- the second is the past participle.
To find the past participle, you have to determine the stem of the infinitive. To do so, drop the -er, -ir, -oir or -re, as usual. Then, add an ending as shown in the following tab :
| Example verb | Ending removed | Ending added | Past participle |
| Jouer | – Er | – é | joué |
| Finir | – ir | – i | fini |
| Vouloir | – oir | – u | voulu |
| Attendre | – re | – u | Attendu |
The verbs avoir, être, and faire have irregular past participles.
avoir : eu
être : été
faire : fait
Most verbs form the passé composé with avoir, however there are a small number of verbs that are always conjugated with être. The most common are :
| verb | example | translation |
| aller | Je suis allé au cinéma. | I went to the cinema. |
| venir | Il est venu me voir. | He came to me. |
| arriver | Tu es arrive hier. | You arrived yesterday |
| Partir | Tu es parti ce matin | You left this morning |
| rester | Tu es resté là | You stayed there |
| retourner | Tu es retourné chez toi | You returned to your place |
| tomber | Je suis tombé | I fell |
| naitre | Je suis né en 1979 | I was born in 1979 |
| mourir | Il est mort l’an dernier | He died last year |
| Passer | Je suis passé devant chez toi | I happened in front of your house |
| monter | Je suis montée chez toi | I climbed to your place |
| descendre | Je suis descend du bus | I got out the bus |
| sortir | Tu es sortie dans la rue | You went out in the street |
| entrer | Il est entré en souriant | He came in with a smile |
| rentrer | Je suis rentrée de vacances | I came back from holidays |
Thoses verbs can be easily remebered by the Acronym MRS. RD VANDERTRAMP:
• M : monté
• R : resté
• S : sorti
• R : revenu
• D : devenu
• V: venu
• A : arrivé
• N : né
• D : descendu
• E : entré
• R : rentré
• T : tombé
• R : retourné
• A : allé
• M : mort
• P : parti
VOCABULARY : TIME
In French, “il est” is used to express the time; though it would literally translate as “he is”, it is actually, in this case, equivalent to “it is” (unpersonal “il”). Unlike in English, it is always important to use “heures” (“hours”) when referring to the time. In English, it is OK to say, “It’s nine,” but this wouldn’t make sense in French.
Quelle heure est-il ? What time is it?
Il est une heure. It is one o’clock.
Il est deux heures. It is two o’clock.
Il est huit heures. It is eight o’clock.
Il est midi. It is noon.
Il est minuit. It is midnight.
Il est six heures cinq. It is five past six.
Il est cinq heures et quart. It is a quarter past five.
Il est trois heures quinze. It is three fifteen.
Il est sept heures et demie. It is half past seven.
Il est sept heures trente. It is seven thirty.
Il est deux heures moins vingt It is twenty to three
Il est quatre heures quarante. It is four forty.