Final consonant

Remember this before going further:

Most of the time, do not pronounce
final d, s, t or x in French words.
As an example, red letters are not pronounced in the following words:

un rebond (a bounce)
franais (French)
un saut (a jump)
heureux (happy)

[on] sound
You will hear "on" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
French
une maison
un garon
comprendre (*)
un combat (*)

English
a house
a boy
to understand
a fight

[ou] sound
You will hear "ou" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
Hint: Pronouce "ou" like "oo".
French
la tour Eiffel
mourir
un mouvement
vous

English
the Eiffel tower
to die
a movement
you

[oi] sound
You will hear "oi" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
French
une fois
un toit
un poisson
croire

English
once
a roof
a fish
to believe

[oin] sound
You will hear "oin" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
French
moins
un point
loin
un soin

English
minus (-)
a point
far away
a care

[ai] sound
You will hear "ai" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
French
une maison
un balai
une caisse
une naissance

English
a house
a broom
a cash register
a birth

[en] sound
You will hear "en" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
Note that "en" and "an" are pronounced the same way.
French
English
encore
again
comprendre
to understand
les parents
the parents
un camembert (*)
a camembert (=a French cheese)
note (*) that "en" before "p" or "b" is written "em".
French
English
un enfant
a child
un croissant
a croissant (French speciality)
le gagnant
the winner
un tambour (**)
a drum
note (**) that "an" before "p" or "b" is written "am".

[eu] sound
You will hear "eu" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
French
l'heure

English
the time

la peur
the fear
une fleur
a flower
un auto-stoppeur
a hitchhiker
N.B. The past participle of the verb avoir (to have) is written eu and is prononced like the letter U .

[in] sound
You will hear "in" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
Note that "in", "ain" and "ein" are pronounced the same way.
French
English
un magasin
a shop
Tintin
Tintin (comics hero)
malin
clever
un timbre (*)
a stamp
note (*) that "in" before "p" or "b" is written "im".
French
un pain
un copain
un train
demain

English
a bread
a friend
a train
tomorrow

French
la peinture
la ceinture
un frein
plein

English
the paint
the belt
a brake
full

[] sound
You will hear "" in the following examples. Press the audio icon to hear the corresponding word.
Note that "-er" at the end of a word is pronounced the same way as "". Many French verbs in the
infinitive end with -er.
French
l'ducation
rvler
Herv Foucher
aimer

English
education
to reveal
my name!
to love

Personal pronouns
First, you have to learn the personal pronouns used in French (pronoms personnels,
). They
could be useful to say something, couldn't they ? So... here they are. Listen to them several times in

order to fully recognize and understand them.

S/P

French
je
tu
il, elle, on
nous
vous
ils, elles

Singular

Plural

English
I
you
he, she, we (but not precise)
we
you
they

Click to hear the correct prononciation.

NB1: vous can be used to talk to someone you do not know very well, or to someone important
(your boss for example). Of course, it can also be used to talk about a group of persons.
NB2: il and ils are for masculine things/persons. elle and elles are for feminine things/persons.

le, la, les (articles dfinis)

le, la and les are the french equivalents for the.
As French makes a distinction between "masculine and feminine objects", people use le for
masculine things/persons and la for feminine things/persons.
However, in the plural, only les is used whatever the gender is.
Anglais
the

Franais
le (m)
la (f)
les (pl)

Le tlphone > les tlphones

La tlvision > les tlvisions
When the following noun begins with a vowel, le or la becomes l'.
L'ordinateur (m) the computer > les ordinateurs
L'le (f) the island > les les
NB: you may have noticed that making plural is easy: most of the time, it consists in adding an "s"
to the noun.

un, une, des (articles indfinis)

un, une and des are the french equivalents for a and some.
un is used for masculine things/persons and une for feminine things/persons.
However, in the plural, only des is used whatever the gender is.
Anglais
a
some

Franais
un (m)
une (f)
des (pl)

 un tlphone > des tlphones

une tlvision > des tlvisions

Building a sentence
It is the same as in English. Most sentences are built on the same template:
Sujet

Verbe

Complment

Translation

La pluie

frappe

sur les carreaux.

The rain hits window-panes.

Les arbres perdent leurs feuilles.

Trees are losing their leaves.

Caroline

Caroline picks some apples.

cueille

des pommes.