Problematic Prepositions: De (Part Trois) Posted by Elizabeth Schmermund on May 8, 2017
Last week on the blog, we went over the rules regarding de when used as an expression of quantity. This is typically very confusing for French learners, as it can be difficult to pick out what exactly an expression of quantity is. We’ll delve a bit more into the grammatical nitty-gritty of what constitutes an expression of…
Talking About Music In French Posted by John Bauer on May 3, 2017
Listening to music is a fun and easy way to not only learn more, but also have fun while doing it! Singing along to Stromae or Baptiste W. Hamon hardly feels like studying, but it is an amazingly useful way to improve your French. I have always loved music and used to be involved in…
It’s spring and inspiration is in the air Posted by Tim Hildreth on May 2, 2017
May has returned and with it the beautiful weather of le printemps (spring) at least here in my little corner of the world. In France that means – even with the stress of les élections présidentielles (the presidential elections), which are particularly heated this year*, and a recent spate of cold weather in the north…
Problematic Prepositions: De (Part Deux) Posted by Elizabeth Schmermund on May 1, 2017
Last week we explored some of the most common usages of the French preposition de. In addition to a preposition that can express possession, relation, and direction, or to link verbs, de can be used to express quantity, either alone or as part of an expression of quantity. Once again, the rules governing how de changes depends on its usage—and this can…
The Origin Of L’Ordinateur – Computers In French Posted by John Bauer on Apr 26, 2017
New technologies comme (like) the Internet and computers need new words to describe them. Those new words either comes from adaptations of older words or are completely new inventions. One such word is computer in French: ordinateur. Le nom (the noun) computer comes from le verbe (the verb) to compute, which originally comes from the…
What would you do? Posted by Tim Hildreth on Apr 25, 2017
Last summer I asked ‘what I did‘ and ‘what you are going to do‘ (looking at the past and future tenses in song). This week, a look at another French tense – and a new song – to learn about le conditionelle (the conditional). Le conditionelle is not actually a tense, but a mood…
Problematic Prepositions: De Posted by Elizabeth Schmermund on Apr 24, 2017
The French preposition de is notorious for giving French learners difficulty at all levels. Why? Because this simple preposition, which generally means “of, from, or about,” can change greatly depending on the word it precedes. De can also be used in many different ways, which also changes the rules regarding its use. Let’s take a look. De is the…