French prepositions and conjunctions
Small words like à, de and en carry a lot of meaning and rarely map one-to-one onto English. The lessons below cover them in the situations where they matter most: places, time and linking ideas.
The essentials
- Cities take à (à Paris); most feminine countries take en (en France), masculine ones au (au Canada).
- À and de contract with le and les: au, aux, du, des.
- Depuis + present for something still going on: j'habite ici depuis deux ans.
Every lesson on this topic
Each lesson has a full explanation, examples you can listen to, and exercises with answers.
A0 (the A0 course)
- J'habite à… = I live in…: À + city
A1 (the A1 course)
- Prepositions with countries: En France, au Canada, aux États-Unis
- Chez: Chez moi, chez le médecin
- Pour + infinitive = in order to: Je travaille pour gagner de l'argent
A2 (the A2 course)
- Depuis, il y a, pendant: For, since, ago
- Avant de + infinitive: Before doing something
B1 (the B1 course)
- Ça fait … que, il y a … que, depuis: Ça fait deux ans que j'habite ici
- Pendant que vs pendant: While vs during
B2 (the B2 course)
- Avant de, sans, au lieu de + infinitive: Prepositions followed by an infinitive
C1 (the C1 course)
- Concession: Whatever, wherever, however
- Le temps que, jusqu'à ce que, en attendant que: Time conjunctions with the subjunctive
C2 (the C2 course)
- Formal connectors: or, néanmoins, dès lors, partant: The logic words of essays and speeches
In the app, these lessons are taught one idea at a time with audio, practised until you get them right on three separate days, and brought back when your own French shows a mistake on them.
Other topics
- The French subjunctive, explained
- French past tenses, explained
- French future and conditional, explained
- French articles and noun gender
- French pronouns, from je to lequel
- French verbs and tenses
- French adjectives and adverbs
- French negation
- Asking questions in French
- French numbers, time and dates
- French idioms and useful structures