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French Grammar Basics Cheat Sheet by marijke

Basic rules to master beginner French!
language french francais grammar

Articles

Article	Female	Male	Plural
the	la	le	les
a	une	un	des

le and la change to l' when used in front of a word starting with a vowel and most words starting with h

une, une, des changes to de when used in negative sentences

Adjectives

Male	Female
-	-e
-e	-
-f	-ve
-x	-se
-er	-ère
-an	-anne
-en	-enne
-on	-onne
-el	-elle
-eil	-eille
-et	-ette / -ète

some common adjectives follow no pattern

when an adjective describes a masculine and feminine noun, use the masculine plural form

Demonstrative Adjective

	Female	Male	these/those
this/that	cette	ce (cet)	ces

cet is used in front of masculine nouns which begin with a vowel and most words beginning with h

add -ci to the end of nouns for close
add -lÃ to the end of nouns for far

Possessive Adjectives

Adjective	Female	Male	Plural
my	ma	mon	mes
your (tu)	ta	ton	tes
his/her/its	sa	son	ses
our	notre	notre	nos
your (vous)	votre	votre	vos
their	leur	leur	leurs

use mon, ton, son with feminine singular nouns in front of vowels and h

Pronouns

who	qui
whom	que
which	lequel
whose	dont
this	ce
that	ça
this	ceci
the one	celle /celui

Personal Pronouns

	Singular	Plural
I	je / moi	nous
you	tu / te /toi	vous
he/it	il	ils /eux
she/it	elle	elles
me	me / moi	nous
him/it	le	les /eux
her/it	la
to him/her/it	lui	leur
oneself	soi
-self	-même	-mêmes

je changes to j' in front of vowels and most h and the word y, same with me and te.

on can be used to mean we, someone, you, they, one or people in general

Possessive Pronouns

Pronoun	Female	Male
mine	la mienne	le mien
yours	la tienne	le tien
his/hers	la sienne	le sien
ours	la nôtre	le nôtre
yours	la vôtre	le vôtre
theirs	la leur	le leur

add s to the end of the pronouns for plural form and use les instead of la, le

en is used in phrases with de to avoid repeating the same word
y is used in phrases with Ã to avoid repeating the same word

Phrases

He's/She's	C'est un/une
They are	C'est sont des
not	ne... pas..
never	ne... jemais...

Plural nouns

Singular	Plural
-eau	-x
-eu	-x
-ou	-s*
-al	-aux
-ail	-aux
-s / -x /-z	nothing added

*some -ou will add -x
In general, all others take -s

Preposition

Preposition
to	à
to + the	à la (f), au (m), aux (p)
from	de
from + the	de la (f), du (m), des (p)
in	en
after	après
before	avant
with	avec
at	chez
against	contre
into	dans
since	depuis
behind	derrière
in front of	devant
between ... and	entre ... et
until	jusque
by/per	par
during	pendant
for	pour
without	sans
except	sauf
under	sous
on	sur
towards	vers
this is	voici
that is	voilà