Building Blocks Part 4: '-re' Verbs

This post continues with regular verbs, looking at them as the building blocks of basic sentences. So far we've explored '-er' and '-ir' verbs, so now we shall look at how to conjugate '-re' verbs.

Conjugation is all about changing the verb (doing word) to fit with subject (person or thing that is doing the action).

Each of the French verb endings are conjugated a.k.a changed,  in different ways. Previosuly, we looked at both the '-ir' and '-er' endings. If you imagine the dots as the stem of the verb, you can see the conjugations for each subject a.k.a personal prounoun, or person or thing doing the action, below:

 
.....er

Je .....e
Tu .....s
Il/Elle/On .....e
Nous .....ons
Vous .....ez
Ils/Elles .....ent 


.....ir

Je .....is
Tu .....is
Il/Elle/On .....it
Nous .....issons
Vous .....issez
Ils/Elles .....issent 

Now we move on to the set of endings for '-re' verbs, which are slightly different again. Note that there is no addition to the stem of the verb when conjugating for il, elle and on.

.....re


Je .....s
Tu .....s
Il/Elle/On .....
Nous .....ons
Vous .....ez
Ils/Elles .....ent

Here are some examples for conjugating the '-er' verbs:

Vendre (to sell)


Je  vends
Tu  vends
Il/Elle/On  vend
Nous  vendons
Vous  vendez
Ils/Elles vendent 



Perdre (to lose)



Je  perds
Tu  perds
Il/Elle/On  perd
Nous  perdons
Vous  perdez
Ils/Elles perdent
 


Attendre (to wait, or to await)

Je  attends
Tu  attends
Il/Elle/On attend
Nous  attendons
Vous  attendez
Ils/Elles attendent
 
Try to remember that the 's' on the end of the je and tu conjugations is not pronounced, and neither is the 't' sound when a verb is conjugated for ils or elles.

If you are up for it, some more regular 're' verbs you can conjugate according to this pattern include:  défendre (to defend), descendre (to descend), entendre (to to hear), étendre (to stretch), fondre (to melt), rendre (to give back or to return), répandre   (to spread or to scatter) and répondre (to answer).

If you practice these 3 patterns of conjugation for the 3 different endings of '-re', '-er' and '-ir' you will find it much easier to speak, write and understand French.Once you've got a good hang of it, it's time to add in some nouns to make longer sentences, or perhaps you will even find yourself learning different tenses to talk about things in the past or the future.

Keep up the good work!