Difficulty with de/d' vs de + article variationsIn the discussion following several of the lessons, there are often questions like Donna's. And, without being unkind to the wonderful moderators/teachers, in NONE of the answers had I seen a really 'eureka' moment of clarification.
And then I searched THE SITE and came across this amazing lesson!
https://www.lawlessfrench.com/grammar/de-vs-du-de-la-des-verbs/.It is brilliant and clears up so much. I think that lesson should be included as a ' 'highlighted related lesson'' to this one and others like ' avoir peur'.
Additionally, in the lesson quoted above there is coverage of phrases meaning "all/specific/adjectivally modified" nouns.
Two great examples of 'avoir envie' are given.
" Il a envie de bon chocolat. He wants (some) good chocolate."
"Il a envie du bon chocolat que tu m’as donné. He wants the good chocolate that you gave me."
Please add or indicate why NOT a similar distinction for the very common 'avoir besoin'.
You have
"J’ai besoin de bonnes chaussures. I need (some) good shoes."
If I were to say to a store clerk "I need (the) special shoes with the orthopedic lifts" would I say ;
"J’ai besoin des chaussures spéciales avec orthopédie."
Merci! Looking forward to the answer.
"The main difference with qu'est-ce que is that this alternative form is never followed by the inverted form when using subject pronouns: " To reword, does this mean that 'qu'est-ce que' cannot be followed by an inversion?
"et je m'étais préparé une journée aux petits oignons."
Since the speaker/narrator is clearly a women, wouldn't the sentence be...
"et je m'étais préparée une journée aux petits oignons." ???
Salut,
Dans cet lesson ça dit qu'on utilise seulement 'leur' et 'lui' quand le verbe est normalement suivi par "à". Je me demande si vous avez une liste des verbes qui sont suivis par "à"?
Merci!
Nicole
In the discussion following several of the lessons, there are often questions like Donna's. And, without being unkind to the wonderful moderators/teachers, in NONE of the answers had I seen a really 'eureka' moment of clarification.
And then I searched THE SITE and came across this amazing lesson!
https://www.lawlessfrench.com/grammar/de-vs-du-de-la-des-verbs/.It is brilliant and clears up so much. I think that lesson should be included as a ' 'highlighted related lesson'' to this one and others like ' avoir peur'.
Additionally, in the lesson quoted above there is coverage of phrases meaning "all/specific/adjectivally modified" nouns.
Two great examples of 'avoir envie' are given.
" Il a envie de bon chocolat. He wants (some) good chocolate."
"Il a envie du bon chocolat que tu m’as donné. He wants the good chocolate that you gave me."
Please add or indicate why NOT a similar distinction for the very common 'avoir besoin'.
You have
"J’ai besoin de bonnes chaussures. I need (some) good shoes."
If I were to say to a store clerk "I need (the) special shoes with the orthopedic lifts" would I say ;
"J’ai besoin des chaussures spéciales avec orthopédie."
Merci! Looking forward to the answer.
the pronunciation tip at the end of this page says that -ais and -ai are pronounced the same. I found a comment by a duolingo mod linking to two pages that says otherwise:
http://bernardcousin.over-blog.com/pages/DE_LIMPORTANCE_DE_BIEN_PRONONCER-8743192.html
https://www.lalanguefrancaise.com/5-astuces-pour-ne-plus-confondre-le-conditionnel-et-le-futur
On forvo it does indeed sound like there is a subtle difference between aimerai and aimerais. é vs è. I hear the difference best when listening to other -ais words on forvo such as vais, sais, etc. It is subtle, but can someone else confirm that there is indeed an actual difference that contradicts the tip on this page?
When to use devoir in the imparfait or the passé composé is very difficult (at least for me). The related lesson in this exercise advises that the imparfait for devoir is used for “supposed to”, and the passé composé is used for “had to” or “must have”. So using that logic, the sentence : “I must have been 3 or 4” should have been translated as “J’ai dû avoir trois ou quatre ans”, but that seems to be incorrect.
Maybe more clarification is needed on that lesson with more examples, because this answer seems to be a contradiction to the lesson .
why not Olivier arrive á la piscine
I don’t understand why this sentence doesn’t need an a to form the passé composé: Il y a quelqu’un “a” caché dans les citrouilles. The correct answer didn’t have the a after quelqu’un. I think to say hidden, past tense, would be “a caché?” Thanks for your help.
It would be good to be able to test yourself on vocabulary. One way would be to show French and English in separate columns to allow one column to be hidden. However, I think you can come up with even better ways to quiz and also track vocabulary proficiency in the same way as you track grammar.
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