I’m learning french and in french there is a lot of verbs in different ways to write each verb in other tense, so I need to remember how to write the same verb in the past, in the present and the future any suggestions to how to do it with the memory techniques?
I’ve been studying French for a few years, and my best advice would just be to not use memory techniques for this. The tenses were all fairly intuitive for me, so I didn’t really feel the need to use memory techniques.
For example, the past tense l’imparfait. The root is just the 1st person plural (nous) present conjugation without the suffix -ons. So for parler, the imparfait root is parlons - ons = parl (which, as is usually the case, is the same as the present tense root).
If what you’re asking is how to find the root for each tense, then there are similar rules like this one for the other tenses. If not, please elaborate so we can see exactly what you’re asking.
I would recommend having a palace or even a room for the different tense. Then create an image for the tense and the noun like us, him, you, and so on. This is really helpful if you are just starting out but if you practice enough, you will just learn them by making verbs into the different tenses.
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I’m learning french already a year I have learned almost all the grammar tenses except of the past simple and the futur antérieur,
But my vocabulary is really small so I don’t really know how to learn all the words right,
And about the conjunctions as I understand in the past there are only three ways as how each verb can look, I need to learn how every verb look in the past present and future
So how to do it right to not get confused?
@Nika120 is this for a course in school or your personal use? In other words, are you trying to learn French or acquire French?
If it’s for your personal use, then I would suggest focusing on acquiring the language. That would mean, mostly focusing on getting more comprehensible input like graded readers, movies, and podcasts. You can use mnemonics, but it’s not the main event. Eventually, and without effort, you’ll just pick up all of this information about grammar and spelling from reading and other input. Scientists have studied this method of language acquisition, and reading is the most efficient method. If you can read an hour a day you can reach a university-student level in just a few years.
If it’s for school, then you’re engaged in language learning and you’ll need to avoid mistakes for points, etc. Therefore, I would suggest:
- Make a character per tense.
- So passé simple could be Jacques Chirac and présent could be Emmanuel Macron. Be sure to pick people that are memorable to you, you could just as well use comic book characters. Don’t go overboard, just do what you need to know for now.
- Assign a small memory palace with at least six stations (rooms or loci) for each tense as well.
- E.g. passé simple is now Chirac at your auntie’s house, and présent is now Macron at your house.
- Next, make another set of characters to represent the pronouns.
- So six more people, that’s one character for each of:
- je,tu, il/elle, nous, vous, ils/elles
- e.g. Je could be yourself, tu could be your best friend
- Create the mnemonic for spelling like this:
- Create a story wherein the tense-character interacts with the pronoun-character and what they’re actually doing provides the mnemonic for spelling. These stories take place in the memory palace for that tense and also the room number provides (redundant) info about which pronoun.
- Always keep the same order so that in each palace: room 1 is je, room 2 is tu, etc.
- Review the palaces from memory and keep adding zany detail for the items you forgot
Here is one concrete example I’ll use the word décoller (to unstick) in the present tense.
- Je décolle / [Your house, first room] Macron and you are unsticking a huge Elephant sticker that blocks almost the whole room. The elephant is turned sideways and looks like the letter E.
- Tu décolles / [Your house, second room] Macron and your best friend are pulling a snake (for S) off that elephant.
- and so on
Because most verbs are regular, I would only suggest doing this much work for the main regular verbs. Like -er and -ir verbs. You can cement this information in your head by regularly walking through these memory palaces, and writing out the correct answers on paper.
Also, I would add that, this seems like a lot of effort and it is! However, if the information isn’t sticking then it’ll be less work than just smashing yourself with repetition. I know some students write out the conjugations every day over and over until they got it. This way, you’ll put in some upfront effort, but you’ll get 100% recall after just a few (like 5) mental walkthroughs.
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Okay tnxx I’ll try to use it tomorrow.
About the french that I’m trying to learn it’s like I’ve been learning it two years at scy and I still more 3 years of learning it, but in school we don’t really talk to language just grammar and stuff so I started month ago watching series in french and tried to expend my vocabulary so I had to learn the grammar tenses for the verbs conjunction,
I really want to improve the speaking and not all those rules
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Cool let us know how it works for you. Good luck.
No problem tnxxx
Hey,
You wrote two months ago, a way for memorising the verbs in french from the third group by memory palace,
Can you explain me again please how to form the room, in a way I won’t get confused,
I need to learn the irregular verbs for :
Passé composé
Imparfait
Plus que parfait
Futur simple
Futur antérieur
Présent
Thanks in advance 