Les temps du passé
Forming the past tense in French can be a challenge for those learning the language, in particular deciding whether to use the past perfect (passé composé) or the imperfect (imparfait).
In this video Boris, a teacher at the alpha.b language school in Nice, provides what is to my mind one of the best explanations that I've come across.
The passé composé is the easier of the tenses to apply as it is used to describe completed events in the past, which are usually easy to identify.
The imparfait on the other hand describes an event that was incomplete, or an ongoing event that was interrupted. It's also used to describe habitual activities, equivalent to the English form used to, as in the expression 'we used to go on holiday to France every year'.
Boris speaks very clearly and not too quickly, I would suggest requiring somewhere around the improving beginner to lower intermediate level to be able to understand him.
I attended the Over-50s course at alpha.b in 2015 and refer to this in my book.
In this video Boris, a teacher at the alpha.b language school in Nice, provides what is to my mind one of the best explanations that I've come across.
The passé composé is the easier of the tenses to apply as it is used to describe completed events in the past, which are usually easy to identify.
The imparfait on the other hand describes an event that was incomplete, or an ongoing event that was interrupted. It's also used to describe habitual activities, equivalent to the English form used to, as in the expression 'we used to go on holiday to France every year'.
Boris speaks very clearly and not too quickly, I would suggest requiring somewhere around the improving beginner to lower intermediate level to be able to understand him.
I attended the Over-50s course at alpha.b in 2015 and refer to this in my book.