📖LearnModule 15 · Lesson 21 of 30Proficient User · CEFR C2 mastery — the capstoneUnit 5 · La grammaire de la précision
Les accords, une dernière fois
Module 15 of the free French course (CEFR C2 mastery — the capstone), lesson 21 of 30: . On this page: 8 words with their genders and respellings, the rule, a watch-out line, the conjugation table and the audio — the study notes behind the workbook's lesson 21.
The words
French
English
Say it
une dernière fois
one last time
ewn dehr-nyehr FWAH
l'auxiliaire employémasculine — the article elides to l'
Respellings follow the course’s say-it key; the stressed syllable is in capitals. Print this lesson’s flashcards (PDF) — the words on the front, the English and respelling on the back.
Hear the words
Each word is read twice — say it back in the gap. Computer-generated voice; credits on the course page.
La règle · The rule
Five things still go wrong at C2 and the first is agreement. Circle every past participle; for each, ask whether the helper is être or avoir, and if avoir, whether an object precedes.
Et aussi · And also
Add the pronominal check from Module 2 of this band: elle s'est lavée against elle s'est lavé les mains. Two minutes, and it is the highest-yield check in the language.
Attention · Watch out
Circle every past participle: with être it agrees with the subject; with avoir only with a direct object that PRECEDES. elle s'est lavée agrees, but elle s'est lavé les mains does not — les mains is the object and comes after.
se laver — the table
je me lave · tu te laves · il/elle se lave · nous nous lavons · vous vous lavez · ils/elles se lavent
Do it now — on paper
Say all 8 words aloud twice from the respelling, then once from the French spelling alone — begin with une dernière fois.
Copy every word with its accents on paper; then cover the English column and write each meaning back from the French.
Write out se laver in full from memory, every person, and check each form against the table above.
This free course is the reading half. The writing half — write-in lessons, daily practice pages with built-in review, self-checks and a full answer key — is the companion workbook series, The French Ladder: one workbook per module, fifteen in all, released band by band with the Basic band (Modules 1–5) first.
Keep these words
Turn this lesson’s words into flashcards, then space your reviews — the two habits the research behind our study guides backs hardest.