French Lesson 1

In this lesson you will:
-Learn how to conjugate the verb to be
-Learn how to conjugate the verb to have
-Learn about the personal pronouns along the way
As you will see, it could not be easier.

1 - être (to be)

Just have a look at the table below, showing the conjugation of the verb to be (être) in French:

I am je suis
you are tu es
he/she is il/elle est
we are nous sommes
you are vous êtes
they are ils/elles sont

What have you learnt by observing this table?

You have learnt most of what there is to know about the personal pronouns in French.

As you can see, I=je, you (singular)=tu, he=il, she=elle, we=nous, you (plural)=vous.

The only pronoun that deserves a comment is the plural 'they'. In English, only one pronoun is used to refer to a group of several people, no matter their gender: the pronoun 'they'. In French though, distinction is made between genders. So, when talking about several people, not just one but two pronouns are used, ils or elles, depending on the context:
-So, when we talk about a group of people including only women, we use 'elles'. Logic, this is the plural form of the singular 'elle' used for females.
-When we talk about a group of people including only men we use 'ils'. Logic, this is the plural form of the singular 'il' used for males.
-And when we talk about a group of people including both women and one or more men, we use 'ils' too. No matter how many women there may be in that group, as long as there is just one man in the group, we must use 'ils' to refer to the group.

    examples:
  1. these women are beautiful.
    they are beautiful = elles sont belles.
  2. these men are kind.
    they are kind = ils sont gentils.
  3. these people (the beautiful women + the kind men) are interesting.
    they are interesting = ils sont intéressants.
  4. Now, all the women + just one man leave the scene together, all the other men stay.
    These people (the women + the man leaving) are tired.
    they are tired = ils sont fatigués.

You have learnt how to conjugate the verb to be in French at the present tense.

As you may have noticed, the verb has 6 forms, one for each person. In English the verb has only 3 forms am, are, is. Like in English, all the forms a verb can have need to be learnt. The only difference is that there are just more of them to learn.

2 - Avoir (to have)

I am je suis I have j'ai
you are tu es you have tu as
he/ she is il/elle est he/ she has il/elle a
we are nous sommes we have nous avons
you are vous êtes you have vous avez
they are ils sont they have ils ont

What have you learnt by observing this table?

You have learnt how to conjugate the verb to be and the verb to have at the present tense.

You have learnt that I am = Je suis but I have = J'ai and not Je ai and you may wonder why.

The answer is simply that the verb form 'ai' starts with a vowel ('a') and when a personal pronoun ending in 'e', like 'je',is followed by a vowel, the 'e' is omitted and an apostrophe is written to mark the contraction.

And that's it. You now know the present of the verb to be, to have and most of what you need to know about the personal pronouns in French.
To tell the truth though, there is a little bit more to learn about personal pronouns than shown in the table above.
Essentially, there has been no mention about the impersonal pronoun 'on' and the polite pronoun 'vous'.
In short, 'on' means 'one' like in 'one should never do that if one wants to stay alive'.
And 'vous' is a polite form for 'tu' (you singular), it's a mark of respect for a person of higher status or a mark of distance with a person you don't know at all, or not so well and with whom you are not intimate.
Basically, 'tu' is used for talking to friends, relatives, classmates, colleagues you are working every day with in the office and so on. Any other more unusual, more formal situation requires the use of 'vous' instead of 'tu'.