Grammaire: 2.2 – Les verbes réguliers (introduction)

Regular verbs (introduction)

Infinitives and Conjugations

So far, we have studied two verbs: être & avoir. As you noticed, each verb has:

• an infinitive form (like the concept of infinity, they are not bound by time). In english, the infinitive form is preceded by ‘to’. Example: to be
• 6 conjugated forms: conjugated in a specific tense (past, present futur) and conjugated in a specific person (je, tu, eil, nous, etc.)

Verb conjugations are traditionally presented in textbooks according to paradigms, or charts, a grammatical term for pattern. A paradigm always includes the infinitive followed by the conjugations according to person which is divided into first, second and third, as well as number, which is the distinction between singular and plural.

Here is a reminder of the être paradigm for the present tense:

Irregular vs. Regular verbs

• Both être & avoir are irregular verbs: they do not follow a pattern in their various conjugations.
• However, many verbs in French are regular, meaning that they do follow a pattern for their conjugation.

Regular French verbs fall into three categories based on the last two letters of the verb. Each category has a particular pattern of conjugation. 

Stem and Endings

To learn the conjugation patterns for each verb category, we will first need to identify the stem of each verb. To do so, we:

• take the infinitive form of the verb
• drop the last two letters: -er, -ir, or -re

Here are the stems of each verb from above:

On the following page, you will learn the endings that will be added to each stem (for -er verbs) to form the complete conjugated verb.