The French have to eat too! Here are some fruits and vegetables you might see at a typical biweekly French market, or even a French supermarket for that matter.

You might even notice some words in the above image that look very familiar to you! How many do you recognize?

Click on the words below to hear each one spoken:

Vegetables (Les légumes)

Cultural notes:

Les poireaux (leeks) are often used in French cooking. Typically you will see them included in dishes that have creamy sauces. Their taste is like an onion, since leeks are a member of the onion family, but leeks are much milder in flavor, and it’s said that those who don’t like onions usually like leeks.

Fruits (les fruits)

la pomme

la poire

les cerises

la pêche

les prunes

les fraises

le raisin

les abricots

Language notes:

1) You might have noticed that some of these fruits and veggies begin with “le,” “la,” or “les.” These words mean “the.” These are what are called articles. We have these in English as the words “the” and “a/an.” In French, nouns have something called gender: they are either masculine or feminine. This concept does not exist in modern English. Nouns that have “la” as their article are feminine. “Le” is masculine. “Les” is the plural article and is used for both masculine and feminine nouns. This will be very important to know for later. When learning nouns as children, French children always learn the article that goes with each noun, which is how I will be presenting nouns in our lessons!

So next time you’re at the supermarket, see how many fruits and vegetables you can name in French!

As you will see, the months of the year are very similar to English! That’s because, like French, the months in English come from Latin, the ancient language of the Romans.

Click on each of the months below to hear them spoken:

janvier

février

mars

avril

mai

juin

juillet

août

septembre

octobre

novembre

decembre

Language notes:

1) In French, syllable stress always falls on the last syllable, unlike in English. So when speaking the months of the year that have more than one syllable, make sure you’re placing your emphasis on the very last syllable of the word. Listen carefully to the months above for that stress.

2) Notice something about the first letter of the months of the year? Not only do they all begin with the same letter as their English counterparts, but also they are not capitalized. If a sentence starts with a month of the year, then it would be capitalized; however in the middle of a sentence, the months are lower-cased.

Here’s an online game for learning the months of the year.

Nolwenn Leroy, a famous French singer, recorded a song using a month in the title called 14 février for her debut album in the early 2000s. Here’s a video of her performing the song live.

The French numbers 1-12 go like this (click on each word to hear the number spoken):

un

deux

trois

quatre

cinq

six

sept

huit

neuf

dix

onze

douze

Language notes:

1) Don’t be fooled by the number “six.” It might look like six, but it’s anything but! It sounds more like “seas” or even the word “cease,” meaning to stop.

2) Here’s something to help you remember some of the numbers. There’s a very sad story involving the numbers 4 through 6. You might have noticed that the number 4 sounds like the English word “cat,” that number 5 sounds like “sank” and that number 6 sounds like “seas.” Here’s a phrase that includes those numbers:

The cat sank into the seas. (cat = quatre [4]) (sank = cinq [5]) (seas = six [6])

You can easily practice numbers in your daily life. Think of all the times we encounter numbers in our daily life: prices, cooking, counting items….. In fact, the next time you’re counting something at home, practice counting those items in French. The more you practice with these numbers, the more naturally it will come to you! You can also practice counting on your fingers and if you have children, you can have them practice counting in French on their fingers as well!

When you have learned these numbers, here’s a fun game you can play online to practice your numbers.

Got the numbers 1 through 12? Now here’s 13-20! Click on each number to hear them spoken:

treize

quatorze

quinze

seize

dix-sept

dix-huit

dix-neuf

vingt

Language notes:

1) Notice the numbers 17 – 19? Seventeen literally means “ten-seven,” eighteen means “ten-eight,” and nineteen means “ten-nine.” This is a common thing in Romance languages with the numbers higher than fifteen. For instance, in Spanish, sixteen (diesiseis) means “ten-six,” seventeen (diesisiete) means “ten-seven.” The same goes for Italian.

When you have practiced these numbers 13-20, here’s an online game for practicing your French numerical knowledge!

Click Numbers to download a PDF document that you can print at home and use to practice your numbers as well.

Click on the image below to make it bigger.

The French language has two kinds of greetings:

1) Formal greetings – greeting words that you use with people you don’t already know, such as strangers and people you have just met. These greetings are on the left side of the above chart.

2) Informal greetings – greeting words that you use with people you know well, such as friends and family. These greetings are on the right side of the above chart.

It is important to remember when to use the formal and informal expressions. Otherwise you might insult someone by being too friendly too quickly! In general, until you get to know someone well, stick with the formal expressions. It’s better to be too formal than to not be formal enough and accidentally insult someone.

Cultural notes:

Not only will knowing French greetings help you with making friends, but also it will come in handy when you are out shopping. When going into French shops, as a formality, customers always greet the shopkeeper with a simple “hello” and always make sure to say “goodbye” when leaving.

Language notes:

1. You might notice that Je m’appelle (My name is) appears twice on this chart. This expression can be used in both formal and informal situations.
2. When answering “how are you,” use comme ci comme ça when you’re feeling okay, not great but not horrible either. It’s a nice middle ground! Bien is the French word for “well,” so if you’re well, you can just respond with a simple bien. Je vais mal means literally “I’m going (I’m doing) badly” (mal is the word for “bad” in French) and is used when things are not going very well at all!
3. You might also notice that ça va appears as both a question and a statement in informal situations. If you want to make it a question, make your voice go up at the end. If you’re answering with ça va, make your voice go down at the end instead, much like we do when speaking English: we make our voice intonation go down at the end when making a statement, but when asking a question, we make our voice go up at the end instead. Click below for examples:

ça va as a statement

Listening:

Click on each of the expressions below to hear them spoken in French:

Formal greetings

Bonjour

Bonsoir

Comment allez-vous

Comme ci comme ça et vous = I’m doing all right, and you?

Bien, et vous = Good, and you?

Je vais mal et vous = Not so well, and you?

Comment vous appelez vous

Je m’appelle

Au revoir = Good bye

A demain = See you tomorrow

Bonne journée = Have a good day

Informal expressions

Salut = Hey

Coucou = Hey hey

ça va = What’s up?

ça va bien = Going well?

comment ça va = How’s it going?

comment vas-tu = How are you doing?

ça va et toi = All right, and you?

pas mal et toi = Not bad, and you?

ça va mal et toi = Badly, and you?

comment t’appelles-tu = What’s your name (literally, “how do you call yourself?”)

quel est ton nom = What is your name (more literal than “comment t’appelles-tu”)

Je m’appelle = My name is (literally “I call myself”)

mon nom est = My name is (more literal than “je m’appelle”)

ciao

à tout à l’heure = See you soon!

a plus= See you later!

Cecilee is also at work adapting her lessons into a format that can be easily viewed online. Once this is done all clients will be given the option to register at this site to review all material between lessons or even look ahead and learn at an accelerated pace. This registration will, of course, be free to current tutoring clients. Those of you who do not live in the Hampton Roads area will also be able to register for remote lessons delivered through this website and online conferencing software, such as Google Hangouts and Skype. Online lessons will be offered at at discounted rate.

We look forward to helping you learn French!

-Cecilee and the website guy.