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

HT
Answered by Holly T. French tutor

2671 Views

See similar French GCSE tutors

Related French GCSE answers

All answers ▸

How can I improve my accent?


What is the speaker trying to have less of? L’année dernière, j’ai commencé à manger plus équilibré. Maintenant je mange une salade mixte à tous les repas. Je mange aussi plus de poisson qu’avant, souvent avec du riz. Je bois moins de coca.


Vous êtes en vacances et vous écrivez à votre ami(e) français(e). Mentionnez: où vous êtes, l’hôtel et vos activités de vacances. Ecrivez environ 40 mots en français.


How do I form the past tense using avoir?


We're here to help

contact us iconContact ustelephone icon+44 (0) 203 773 6020
Facebook logoInstagram logoLinkedIn logo

MyTutor is part of the IXL family of brands:

© 2026 by IXL Learning