How to form the past tense in passé composée?

Like in English, to form the past tense, we need o  1) The person (I) o  2) An auxiliary verb (have) o  3) Past participle (eaten)
·     Most verbs take ‘avoir’ as their auxiliary verb, so like ‘j’ai mange’ BUT the “MRS VANDERTRAMP” verbs take ‘etre’ instead so ‘I have gone’ à ‘Je suis allée’ ·     With the past tense, we only change the auxiliary verb to fit the person. E.g. j’ai mangé, tu as mangé, elle a mangé. With verbs that take ‘avoir’ as their auxiliary, the past participle (mangé) stays the same for all the different people (as seen in the above example)  ·     However, for MRS VANDERTRAMP verbs, the past participle (mangé) has to be altered slightly whenever it is feminine singular or feminine plural (so when you are talking about one woman or feminine object, or more than one woman or feminine object) o  That means, whenever you want to say ‘she’ (elle) or ‘they’ (elles) did something in the past, the past participle has to be altered. o  For singular feminine, you add ‘e’ to the end of the past participle. E.g. Elle est allée, and for plural feminine you add ‘es’ so e.g. Elles sont allées

Answered by Holly T. French tutor

1870 Views

See similar French GCSE tutors

Related French GCSE answers

All answers ▸

How do you form the past compound tense?


Quel est votre opinion sur l'environnement? Que fait votre famille pour aider l'environnement?


How do I know when to use the imperfect tense?


How do I know if I need to make the adjective agree with the noun in the masculine or feminine way?


We're here to help

contact us iconContact usWhatsapp logoMessage us on Whatsapptelephone icon+44 (0) 203 773 6020
Facebook logoInstagram logoLinkedIn logo
Cookie Preferences