11 Verbs

Present Tense

The present tense describes something that is happening now, or a condition that continues to exists:

Je parle très vite. "I am speaking very quickly," or "I speak very quickly."
Elle préfère le poisson à la viande. "She prefers fish to meat."

Citation of Verbs

In French, the dictionary cites each verb in its infinitive form. The infinitive form is the form that does not refer to person, number or time. The equivalent in English is the "to + verb" form, e.g. "to speak".

The French verb that means "to speak" is cited in the dictionary as parler.

There are also finite forms of verbs. In English, the finite forms of the verb "to speak" are the verb "speaks", as in "he speaks very quickly", "speak", as in "I speak very quickly", and "spoke", as in "he spoke very quickly". That completes the list of simple finite forms of the verb "to speak".

However, each French verb has many more simple finite forms than the equivalent verb in English. The Vocab Builder will help you to learn them.

Conjugating

French verbs change their forms according to the person and number of the subject. To see how this works, let us look at a sentence using the verb parler in the present tense.

Je parle très vite. I speak very quickly.

In this sentence, je ("I") is the subject, and parle ("speak") is the verb. You can see in the table below how the form of parler changes to reflect the person and number of the subject.

parler - Present Tense

1st Person Singular Je parle très vite. I speak very quickly.

2nd Person Singular Tu parles très vite. You speak very quickly.

3rd Person Singular Masculine Il parle très vite. He speaks very quickly.

3rd Person Singular Feminine Elle parle très vite. She speaks very quickly.

1st Person Plural Nous parlons très vite. We speak very quickly.

2nd Person Plural Vous parlez très vite. You speak very quickly.

3rd Person Plural Masculine Ils parlent très vite. They speak very quickly.

3rd Person Plural Feminine Elles parlent très vite. They speak very quickly.

*parler* - Present Tense
1st Person Singular	Je parle très vite.	I speak very quickly.
2nd Person Singular	Tu parles très vite.	You speak very quickly.
3rd Person Singular Masculine	Il parle très vite.	He speaks very quickly.
3rd Person Singular Feminine	Elle parle très vite.	She speaks very quickly.
1st Person Plural	Nous parlons très vite.	We speak very quickly.
2nd Person Plural	Vous parlez très vite.	You speak very quickly.
3rd Person Plural Masculine	Ils parlent très vite.	They speak very quickly.
3rd Person Plural Feminine	Elles parlent très vite.	They speak very quickly.

Many verbs follow the same pattern as parler. They are called er verbs, because the infinitive of these verbs ends in er.

Formal and Informal Speech

The pronoun tu, for "you" (singular), is only used amongst friends, or when speaking to younger people. Until close relationships are established, always use the vous form, even when speaking to one person. The vous form is also used in both formal and informal speech when the plural form of "you" is needed.

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