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Grammar

This is where the rule makes sense. In Exercises you practise until it comes out.

edumaterial's parts within the level. The European framework does not subdivide them.

CEFR A1 part 1

• Gender and the article: le, la, l', un, une

  Every French noun is masculine or feminine; gender cannot be guessed from meaning alone, and before a vowel both “le” and “la” become “l'”.

  A13 Your turn

• The present tense and the explicit subject

  In a basic personal present-tense sentence, French expresses the subject; the same present covers habits and actions happening now.

  A13 Your turn

• Two-part negation: ne… pas wraps around the verb

  In French the negative is not one word before the verb: it is two, and the verb sits between them.

  A13 Your turn

• Accents and the cedilla: they do not tell you where the stress falls

  The French accent does not mark the stressed syllable: it either changes the sound of the letter or tells apart two words that would otherwise look the same.

  A13 Your turn

CEFR A1 part 2

• Du, de la, des: the article your language leaves out

  To talk about an unspecified quantity or unidentified plural items, French requires a determiner: du, de la, de l’ or des.

  A13 Your turn

• Au, aux, du, des: when à and de collide with the article

  “à” and “de” cannot sit next to “le” and “les”: they merge, and it is not a stylistic choice.

  A13 Your turn

• The passé composé: two pieces and an auxiliary you have to choose

  French very often uses two pieces for a completed everyday event: “avoir” or “être” plus the participle; the auxiliary is part of the construction.

  A13 Your turn

CEFR A2 part 1

• Le, la, les, lui or leur: object and position

  With the core verbs in this lesson, le/la/les replace a direct object and lui/leur replace a person object with à; all go before the verb that governs them.

  A23 Your turn

• En and y: replacing quantities, de, à and places

  “En” picks up a “de” and “y” picks up an “à”, and both go in front of the verb so that you do not repeat what has already been said.

  A23 Your turn

• Imparfait or passé composé: setting, habit and event

  They are not two interchangeable pasts: the imparfait paints the set and the passé composé tells you what happens in front of it.

  A23 Your turn

CEFR A2 part 2

• Future and conditional: stems, endings and uses

  The future and the conditional are built on the same stem and differ only in their endings: one says what will happen, the other what would happen.

  A23 Your turn

• Qui, que, où or dont: find the gap

  You do not choose the relative by what it means, but by the hole it fills inside its own clause.

  A23 Your turn

• The verb and its preposition: à, de or none

  The preposition following a verb belongs to its pattern: learn it with the verb and check it in context, because translation cannot choose it reliably.

  A23 Your turn

CEFR B1 part 1

• French subjunctive: forms, triggers and contrast with the indicative

  You do not choose the mood by translating: first identify the expression introducing the subordinate clause, then check whether the two verbs share a subject.

  B13 Your turn

• Past participle agreement: auxiliary, object and position

  The question is not only “which auxiliary is used?” but “what can it agree with, and where does that element appear?”

  B13 Your turn

• Reported speech: person, tense and viewpoint

  Reporting someone’s words is not a matter of replacing quotation marks with “que”: rebuild who speaks, when the report happens and from where.

  B13 Your turn

CEFR B1 part 2

• Si clauses: real, imagined and past conditions

  The tense immediately after conditional si shows how the speaker presents the condition: open, imagined or already impossible.

  B13 Your turn

• On and the passive: choosing sentence focus

  “On” and the passive can describe the same event but organise information differently: one keeps an action with an implicit human agent, while the other turns the affected entity into the subject.

  B13 Your turn

• Spoken and written French: adapting register

  There are not two disconnected grammars but a continuum of registers. Judge a form by who is speaking, to whom, for what purpose and in which genre.

  B13 Your turn

CEFR B2 part 1

• Advanced French negation: restriction, combinations and expletive ne

  The structures at this level often combine ne with a second element, but not all negate: ne… que restricts, while expletive ne only marks register.

  B23 Your turn

• Depuis, pendant, il y a, dans and en: duration, origin and deadline

  The choice does not depend on the number alone: distinguish continuity from an origin, bounded duration, distance into the past, future delay and completion time.

  B23 Your turn

• Gérondif, participe présent and adjectif verbal: three -ant forms

  Three forms end in -ant and perform different functions: the gérondif expresses a circumstance, the present participle often condenses a clause, and the verbal adjective assigns a quality and agrees.

  B23 Your turn

CEFR B2 part 2

• Pronominal verbs: classes, auxiliary and participle agreement

  All pronominal verbs form compound tenses with être; agreement requires analysing the role of se and the pattern of each essentially pronominal verb.

  B23 Your turn

• Conditional for unconfirmed information: present, past and source

  In a French news report, a conditional is not setting up a hypothesis: it is warning you that the paper could not confirm the fact.

  B23 Your turn

• Nominalisation in written French: formation, complements and style

  Nominalisation can turn a process or quality into the topic of a text; it is frequent in formal writing, but it does not determine register on its own.

  B23 Your turn

CEFR C1

• The passé simple: recognising the written narrative past

  The passé simple is a narrative tense found mainly in literary, historical and biographical writing. Everyday French usually uses the passé composé instead; at C1 the priority is to recognise the tense and understand its role in a narrative.

  C13 Your turn

• Mise en relief: building focus in French

  Mise en relief turns one constituent into explicit focus. French can also use intonation, dislocation and other marked orders, but cleft constructions state precisely which element is contrasted.

  C13 Your turn

• Argument connectors: guiding the reasoning

  An argument connector is not decoration or a device for avoiding repetition: it signals the logical relationship the reader should build. Replacing it may leave two grammatical sentences while destroying the reasoning.

  C13 Your turn

We're writing the rest. New rounds go up every week.