Les adverbs de temps
(adverb of time)
Adverbs of time tell when an event occurs.
They are also called “locutions adverbials de temp” especially when they are made up of more than one word.
Here is a list of the common ones.
| FRENCH | ENGLISH |
| Il y a longtemps | Long ago |
| Maintenant | Now |
| Depuis que/quand | Since when |
| Depuis | Since |
| Quand | When |
| Tout a heure | See you soon |
| Avant | Before |
| Toujours | Always |
| Souvent | Often |
| Parfois | Sometimes |
| Jamais | Never |
| Autre fois | In the past |
| Il etait une fois | Once upon a time |
| Bientot | Soon |
| Quelque fois | Sometimes |
| Tous les jours | Every day/ all day |
| Le matin | In the morning |
| Hier | Yesterday |
| Aujourd’ hui | Today |
| Apres | After |
| Ce matin | This morning |
| Cette après mide | This afternoon |
| Quell que jour | Someday |
| L’annee prochaine | Next year |
| e.t.c |
Note that adverbs of time can be classified into three different groups.
Those tht indicate the past
Those that indicate the present
Those that indicate the future
Exercise
Classify the adverbs in the table into three groups
Present
Past
Future
Make fifteen (15) sentences
Five (5) sentences for each category:
Examples
Je suis a l’ecole maintent (present)
Je suis alle au marche hier (Past)
J’irai a paris a l’annee Prochaine (future)
L’imparfait
The French imperfect tense is mainly used to talk about things that used to happen regularly in the past. E.g. j’allais chaque annee en vacances.
To form the imperfect, we use the ‘nous’ form of the “present tense” and remove the ONS. To this stem, the following endings are added
Je ais
Tu ais
Il ait
Elle ait
Nous ions
Vous iez
Ils aient
Ells aient
Note: There are exception for verbs such as “etre” whose stem is et – “manger” whose stem is “mang” and not “mange” ranger whose stem is “rang” not “range”.
It is also worth while to know that for verbs like “Commencer”, the last – C – changes to – C – before vowel letters – a – o and u.
Example: In nous commencons” the stem of the verb is commenc “and not “commen”
DEVOIR
Faites des excercises suivantes
Fill in the gaps with the correct imperfect tense
See also