Lesson 1: Ça va ? How are you?

You are currently viewing Lesson 1: Ça va ? How are you?

Lesson 1: Ça va ? How are you?

Bonjour ! French Basics Lesson 1: Ça va ? How are you?

In this first lesson, you’ll learn basic greetings and courtesy expressions in French.

Bonjour ! Hello! The Basics

Let’s start with basic greetings.

  • Bonjour. Hello. Good morning.
  • Salut. Hi.
  • Bon après-midi. Bonjour. Good afternoon.
  • Bonsoir. Good evening.
  • Bonne nuit. Good night.
  • Au revoir. Good-bye.

À bientôt ! See You Soon!

Here are a few more friendly expressions that you might want to be able to use.

  • À bientôt. See you soon.
  • À plus tard. See you later.
  • À demain. See you tomorrow.
  • Enchanté(e). Nice to meet you.
  • Dors bien ! Dormez bien ! Sleep well! (informal, formal)

GRAMMAR NOTE

Did you notice that there are two forms for the expression nice to meet you? That’s because the expression literally means enchanted, as you might be able to tell, and since enchanted is an adjective, it has to agree with the person it describes. A man is enchanté, and a woman is enchantée. We’ll talk about French adjectives much more throughout this course, but for now just keep in mind that you normally add an –e to the masculine in order to form the feminine: français (French, masculine), française (French, feminine); américain (American, masculine), américaine (American, feminine).

You can see the same thing in bonjour and bonsoir compared to bonne nuit. Bon is masculine good, and bonne is feminine good, because le jour (the day) and le soir (the evening) are masculine, but la nuit (the night) is feminine.

Comment vas-tu ? How Are You?

Let’s see a few expressions that you can use when you meet someone, as well as a few more general courtesy and basic expressions.

GRAMMAR NOTE

French has a polite or formal you (vous), and familiar you (tu). Use vous when you’re speaking to strangers, especially older ones, or anyone in a position of authority or respect. Use tu with kids, your family, close friends, and people your own age or younger. These two pronouns take different verb forms, as you can see in the second line below, Comment vas-tu (how are you? [informal)) and Comment allez-vous (how are you? [formal)).

  • Ça va ?
    How’s it going? (casual)
  • Comment vas-tu ? Comment allez-vous ?
    How are you? (informal, formal)
  • Ça va. Je vais bien.
    I’m fine.
  • Merci.
    Thank you.
  • Je vous en prie./ De rien.
    You’re welcome.
  • S’il te plaît. S’il vous plaît.
    Please. (informal, formal)
  • Excuse-moi. Excusez-moi.
    Excuse me. (informal, formal)
  • Désolé(e) !
    Sorry!
  • Comment t’appelles-tu ? Comment vous appelez-vous ?
    What is your name? (informal, formal)
  • Je m’appelle…
    My name is…
  • D’où es-tu ? D’où êtes-vous ?
    Where are you from? (informal, formal)
  • Je suis de…
    I’m from…

GRAMMAR NOTE

French verbs are conjugated, meaning that they change form to match the subject. English does this a little: you learn but he/she learns. The idea is the same in French, but there are more forms and endings. You’ve already seen a few verbs in different forms for je (I), tu (you, familiar), and vous (you, polite). Note that je becomes j’ before a vowel sound.

 je…tu…vous…
être (to be)suisesêtes
aller (to go)vaisvasallez
s’appeler (to be called)m’appellet’appellesvous appelez

There’s more to the story, but for now just remember that tu verb forms typically end in –s, and most vous verb forms end in -ez. The verb êtes is one of just two French verbs whose vous form ends in –s instead of –ez. French has a lot of irregular verbs, especially the common ones, but even with those you can see common patterns. We’ll gradually cover that in this course.

PUNCTUATION NOTE

Notice that you leave a space before question marks and exclamation points in French: Ça va ? Enchanté ! Notice also that you write a hyphen between the verb and subject in questions: D’où es-tu ? Comment allez-vous ?

Congratulations!

You’ve completed the lesson. Go back and review if you’d like, or take the practice quizzes to test yourself. If you’d like to set up a live practice lesson with an instructor, email us at info@thelanguagegarage.com, or enroll in live online lessons here.  Some quick links you may want to use:

Lesson Content
Back to Course
Next Quiz