Agreement of Adjectives

Unit 1: Lesson 5

Parts of Speech

An ADJECTIVE is a word that describes a Noun.

A NOUN is a person, place, thing, or idea.

Colors as AdjectivesIn this unit, we are learning the basics of the

language by applying the most simple (and yet most widely-used) grammar rules to simple vocabulary (animals and colors).

Colors are used to describe items, even in English: it is a blue jacket, those are red pens – and, as such, are ADJECTIVES.

We will therefore be using colors as our ADJECTIVES (things that describe nouns) and animals as our NOUNS (people, places, things, or ideas).

Rule 3

In French, An Adjective must always agree

with the Noun it modifies in GENDER (masculine / feminine)

&

in NUMBER (singular / plural).

Rule 4In French,

An Adjective is given or listed in the MASCULINE, SINGULAR form

&

It is up to the language user toMODIFY (change) the adjective

in order to make it agreewith the noun it modifies

in GENDER (m/f) and NUMBER (s/pl).

Charting

The following chart can be used to help simplify the agreement of adjectives:

Masculine Feminine

Singular

Plural

MS FS = + E

We have already seen how to make something agree with a feminine noun.

When we were learning Indefinite Articles, the article “un” was used with Masculine, Singular nouns, whereas the word “une” was used with Feminine, Singular nouns.

Therefore, to make agreement from Masculine Singular to Feminine Singular, we will usually add an “e” to the end of the word.

Charting

The following chart can be used to help simplify the agreement of adjectives:

Masculine Feminine

Singular * + e

Plural

S PL = + SWe have already seen how to make something

in French plural. Unless the noun was irregular, we simply added an “s” to it to make it plural, just like in English.

With adjectives, therefore, the same theory applies: unless it is irregular, we simply add “s” to a word to make the word change from its singular form to its plural form.

Note: For feminine plural, be sure to add your “e” for feminine BEFORE your “s” for plural!

Charting

The following chart can be used to help simplify the agreement of adjectives:

Masculine Feminine

Singular * + e

Plural + s + es

brun, noir, bleu, vert

The colors (adjectives) listed above are Regular and follow the rules we just discussed:

1) They are given in the Masculine, Singular form.

2) To make the adjective agree with the noun it modifies, we simply add “e” to agree with a feminine noun and “s” to agree when the noun is plural.

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “BLEU” (blue)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular bleu

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we simply add “s” to bleu in its Masculine Plural Form, add “e” to bleu to make it Feminine Singular, and “es” to bleu to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular bleu bleue

Plural bleus bleues

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “VERT” (green)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular vert

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we simply add “s” to vert in its Masculine Plural Form, add “e” to vert to make it Feminine Singular, and “es” to vert to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular vert verte

Plural verts vertes

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “BRUN” (brown)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular brun

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we simply add “s” to brun in its Masculine Plural Form, add “e” to brun to make it Feminine Singular, and “es” to brun to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular brun brune

Plural bruns brunes

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “NOIR” (black)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular noir

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we simply add “s” to noir in its Masculine Plural Form, add “e” to noir to make it Feminine Singular, and “es” to noir to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular noir noire

Plural noirs noires

Rule 1

Although you are learning these rules “out-of-order”, this is perhaps the most important rule you can memorize in French:

In French,There is always an exception to every rule.

So, whenever you “happen” upon any exception, MEMORIZE it as an exception to the rule.

Exceptions

Although we will generally add “e” for feminine singular, “s” for masculine plural, and “es” for feminine plural, there are exceptions to this practice.

Exception 1: “s”

Question: What do we do if the adjective already ends in “s” in the masculine, singular form, like “gris”? Do we add a second “s” to make it agree in the masculine plural form?

Exception 1: “s”

Answer: Remember when we were making Nouns plural and there were certain nouns (ours, souris, etc) which already ended in ‘s’? – We left them alone. We did not do anything to the end of those nouns. When this happens to an ADJECTIVE, you do NOTHING when changing the adjective from masculine singular to masculine plural, but you must still change the adjective to make it agree with the feminine singular and feminine plural forms.

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “GRIS” (gray)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular gris

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we do nothing to gris in its Masculine Plural Form, add “e” to gris to make it Feminine Singular, and “es” to gris to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular gris grise

Plural gris grises

Exception 2: “e”

Question: What do we do if the adjective already ends in “e” in the masculine, singular form, like “rose”? Do we add an extra “e” to change the adjective in order to make it agree with the feminine singular and plural forms?

Exception 2: “e”Answer: When a word already ends in the letter

you need to add and there are no accents over any of those letters, then you do NOT have to add that letter again to the end of the word. In the case of adjective such as “rose”, “rouge”, “jaune”, et “orange”, each adjective already ends in the letter “e” and there is no accent over the letter “e”; therefore, you do NOTHING to the end of the adjective to make it agree with the feminine singular form, but you still have to add “s” to make it agree in the plural forms.

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “ROSE” (pink)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular rose

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we do nothing to rose in its Feminine Singular form, add “s” to rose to make it Mascluine Plural, and “s” to rose to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular rose rose

Plural roses roses

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “JAUNE” (yellow)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular jaune

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we do nothing to jaune in its Feminine Singular form, add “s” to jaune to make it Mascluine Plural, and “s” to jaune to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular jaune jaune

Plural jaunes jaunes

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “ROUGE” (red)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular rouge

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified

the adjective correctly. Notice how we do nothing to rouge in its Feminine Singular form, add “s” to rouge to make it Mascluine Plural, and “s” to rouge to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular rouge rouge

Plural rouges rouges

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “ORANGE” (orange)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular orange

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified the

adjective correctly. Notice how we do nothing to orange in its Feminine Singular form, add “s” to orange to make it Mascluine Plural, and “s” to orange to make it Feminine Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular orange orange

Plural oranges oranges

Exception 3

Question: But what about the other colors that we have not discussed? – Purple, White, and the other word for Brown: Marron?

Exception 3

Answer: Sometimes a word is entirely different than any rule or has to be discussed separately.

Blanc

In the case of adjectives that end in “-anc”, the feminine form is different.

Instead of simply adding “e” to the end of the adjective, we must add “he”.

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “BLANC” (white)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular blanc

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified the

adjective correctly. Notice how we simply add “s” to the adjective in the Masculine Plural form, add “he” in the Feminine Singular Form, and add “hes” in the Feminine Plural Form.

Masculine Feminine

Singular blanc blanche

Plural blancs blanches

Violet & Maron

In the case of adjectives that end in “-et” and “-on”, the feminine form is different.

Instead of simply adding “e” to the end of the adjective, we must double the consonant (the ‘t’ or the ‘n’) and then add “e”.

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “VIOLET” (purple)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular violet

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified the

adjective correctly. Notice how we simply add “s” to the Masculine Plural form, double our “t” and add “e” to Feminine Singular form, and add “s” to the Feminine Singular form to make it Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular violet violette

Plural violets violettes

Charting

Can you use the chart to Modify (change) the adjective “MARON” (brown)?

Masculine Feminine

Singular maron

Plural

Charting If your chart looks like this, then you modified the

adjective correctly. Notice how we simply add “s” to the Masculine Plural form, double our “n” and add “e” to Feminine Singular form, and add “s” to the Feminine Singular form to make it Plural.

Masculine Feminine

Singular maron maronne

Plural marons maronnes