Lesson 12A1

-ER, -IR, -RE Verbs & Daily Routine

Almost every French verb belongs to one of three predictable families, named after their infinitive ending. English verbs barely conjugate at all (I speak, you speak, he speaks — only one form changes), so French asking you to actively produce six different endings per verb is new work, but learn the pattern once per family and you can conjugate hundreds of verbs at a stroke.

Grammar Comparison

-ER verbs: the largest family (parler)

French

je parle, tu parles, il/elle/on parle, nous parlons, vous parlez, ils/elles parlent

English

I speak, you speak, he/she speaks, we speak, you speak, they speak

Over 90% of French verbs end in -er and follow this exact pattern: drop -er from the infinitive and add -e, -es, -e, -ons, -ez, -ent. Notice je/tu/il/ils forms (parle, parles, parle, parlent) all sound identical despite different spellings — English at least always marks the he/she form with -s (speaks), but French's spoken verb often doesn't change at all across four of the six persons, so you have to rely on the pronoun, not the verb, to know who's doing the speaking. Once you know parler, you already know how to conjugate travailler, écouter, regarder, and hundreds more.

-IR verbs: the regular pattern (finir)

French

je finis, tu finis, il/elle/on finit, nous finissons, vous finissez, ils/elles finissent

English

I finish, you finish, he/she finishes, we finish, you finish, they finish

Regular -ir verbs like finir (to finish) and choisir (to choose) insert -iss- before the plural endings (-issons, -issez, -issent) — a telltale marker of this family, and here the endings really are pronounced differently across persons, unlike the -er family. Warning: not every verb ending in -ir follows this pattern (see the next note) — dormir and sortir look like -ir verbs but conjugate quite differently.

-RE verbs: the third family (vendre)

French

je vends, tu vends, il/elle/on vend, nous vendons, vous vendez, ils/elles vendent

English

I sell, you sell, he/she sells, we sell, you sell, they sell

Regular -re verbs like vendre (to sell) and attendre (to wait) drop -re and add -s, -s, (nothing), -ons, -ez, -ent — notice the il/elle/on form has no ending at all, so vend is pronounced with the d silent, just 'vahn'. This is the opposite of English, which marks he/she with an audible -s (sells) — in French, the 'no ending' form is the third-person singular, not the base form.

Irregular -ir verbs that break the -iss- pattern

French

dormir: je dors, tu dors, il dort, nous dormons, vous dormez, ils dorment

English

to sleep (dormir) doesn't follow the -iss- pattern — a different shape entirely

dormir (to sleep), sortir (to go out), and partir (to leave) end in -ir but conjugate completely differently from finir: the singular forms drop a consonant from the stem (dor-m-ir → je dors, not je dormis) and there's no -iss- anywhere. These have to be memorized as their own small irregular group, not lumped in with finir-type verbs.

manger keeps its 'e' before -ons

French

nous mangeons (not nous mangons)

English

an extra 'e' is kept purely to preserve the soft 'g' sound

manger (to eat) is a regular -er verb, but nous mangons would make the g sound hard (like 'gone'), changing the pronunciation. French inserts an extra e — nous mangeons — purely to keep the g soft, matching all the other forms. This same trick shows up in other -ger verbs like voyager (nous voyageons) and manger-like verbs ending in -cer, which insert a cedilla instead (nous commençons).

Vocabulary

French	Pronunciation	English
parler	par-LAY	to speak (-er)
travailler	trah-vah-YAY	to work (-er)
manger	mahn-ZHAY	to eat (-er, spelling quirk)
écouter	ay-koo-TAY	to listen
regarder	ruh-gar-DAY	to watch/look at
finir	fee-NEER	to finish (-ir, regular)
choisir	shwah-ZEER	to choose (-ir, regular)
vendre	VAHN-druh	to sell (-re)
attendre	ah-TAHN-druh	to wait (-re)
dormir	dor-MEER	to sleep (irregular -ir)
sortir	sor-TEER	to go out (irregular -ir)
se réveiller	suh ray-vay-YAY	to wake up
le matin	luh mah-TAN	the morning

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