French Lesson 2: Negative and Interrogative Forms - Articles - Verbs

The verb être (to be) is completely irregular and must be learnt by heart.

• Je suis
• Tu es
• Il, elle, on est
• Nous sommes
• Vous êtes
• Ils, elles sont

The negative is made with two elements: NE ... PAS
In affirmative sentences, the first element, ne (n' before a vowel), comes between the subject and the verb. The second element, often pas, but that may be jamais, or rien, comes after the verb.
Study the distribution of pronouns in a negative sentence:
Il ne m'appelle jamais (He never calls me).
Je ne te le présente pas (I don't present him to you).
Je n'y habite pas I don't live there).

When the negative meaning already appears in another word, we generally add only one element:
Personne ne m'appelle (Nobody calls me)
but we are not afraid to emphasise: Personne ne m'appelle jamais (Nobody ever calls me). 
In casual conversations, we often drop ne and it is almost "swallowed", even in formal conversations. When pronounced, it is almost always pronounced as if it were before a vowel. 
In item 15, notice the place of y in a negative sentence.

French articles can be definite or indefinite, masculine or feminine, singular or plural, plain or elided or contracted.

After the verb être the indefinite article is omitted when the verb is followed by a noun indicating nationality or profession:
Item 10: Je suis professeur.
When c'est (this is) is used instead of il est, the indefinite article is used:
C'est un professeur.

You may have noticed in the former column that the plural was carried not only by the article.
The plural is often marked by adding the letter -s at the end of the word, noun or adjective, when it does not already end with -s or -x.

When this mark applies to an adjective that comes before a noun beginning with a vowel
it is not only a graphical sign:
French language links the words phonetically.

Compare the pronunciation of un arbre (a tree) and des arbres trees):
and

compare also un gros arbre (a big tree), un grand arbre (a tall tree), des grands arbres (tall trees):
and and
Liaison and elision

French nouns are masculine or feminine. Except for sexed creatures, the gender is arbitrary.
There are some large categories, with large numbers of exceptions, so the better thing to do is to learn a noun with its indefinite article.
There is no article with proper names... generally. Though having proper names, countries have a definite article.
The country names ending with e are feminine. Compare: la France, la Belgique, la Chine, la Mongolie, la Tunisie, etc
with: le Maroc, le Soudan, le Japon, le Chili, le Danemark.
A country name including a common noun takes the gender of the common noun:
un état, un émirat are masculine nouns so les Etats Unis, les Emirats Arabes are masculine.
Une montagne is feminine, so Les Montagnes Rocheuses are feminine.

Several interrogative words are used to ask questions, according to the answer you expect.

If you want to know "who", use: Qui?

Qui chante?

If you want to know "what", use: Que (qu')?

Que chantes-tu? Qu'est-ce que tu chantes?

If you want to know "where", use: Où?

Où vas-tu?

If you want to know "when", use: Quand?

Quand viens-tu?

If you want to know "how", use: Comment?

Comment allez-vous?

If you want to know "how much or how many", use: Combien (de)?

Combien ça mesure? Combien de maisons achètez-vous?

If you want to know "why", use: Pourquoi?

Pourquoi étudies-tu le français?

If you want to know "which", use: Quel, quels, quelle or quelles? (Quel agrees with the noun).

Quelle langue parlez-vous?

Without a noun, you ask using: Lequel, auquel, duquel , laquelle, etc (they agree, even if the noun is absent

Lesquelles parlez-vous?

The last case is possible only if your interlocutor knows what you are talking about.

In items 15 and 17 y represents an adverbial phrase of place.
It represents the nearest adverbial phrases, so, when you use several adverbial phrases and then usey to refer to one of them, be sure that you really mean the last adverbial phrase you said; your interlocutor refers y to your last adverbial phrase.

Quel and its derivatives