Age and origin in French

Level A1

Age and origin in French

After exchanging names, add two details: your age and where you are from. French uses avoir for age and être with a place for origin. Here you will speak to someone you address as tu and practise with Paris and Brazil.

A few words to bring back

Je means I; tu means you when speaking to one person you address informally. Keep these subjects in the sentences here: j'ai = I have, tu as = you have; je suis = I am, tu es = you are. Avoir and être are the dictionary forms of these two verbs.

Vingt is 20, trente is 30 and âge means age. Listen to the cards, then listen to those numbers inside the age sentences below. You can work with these two ages even if you have not studied the whole number chart.

Age: J'ai vingt ans

French says that you have an age: J'ai vingt ans means I am twenty years old, literally I have twenty years. Ans means years when counting age; put the number between j'ai and ans. For these ages, keep the written -s of ans, although you do not hear that -s. Je loses its e before ai, giving j'ai.

Learn Quel âge tu as ? as one everyday question meaning How old are you?: quel âge asks what age, and tu as means you have. The question uses tu before as, with the questioning voice you hear in the recording. Change only vingt to trente in your answer: J'ai trente ans. Unlike English, French uses avoir, not être, to state age this way.

J'ai … ans

Origin: de Paris, du Brésil

Tu es d'où ? means Where are you from?: tu es is you are, où is where, and d'où means from where. Here de indicates origin; its e disappears before où, giving d'où. Je suis de Paris means I am from Paris, the city; Je suis du Brésil means I am from Brazil, the country. These sentences tell your origin, which need not be where you live now.

Why du? The country name is le Brésil, and de + le joins into du: Je suis du Brésil, not de le Brésil. Paris has no article in this expression, so it stays de Paris. Learn these two place expressions together with their names; du is not the form for every country.

Recognition only: the last example, Je viens du Brésil, can also give your origin in this conversation. It uses venir de, come from; here viens means come with je. Listen and recognize it, but use je suis in your own answers for this lesson.

Je suis de / du …

Ana and Louise exchange two details

Ana is A and Louise is B; they are talking on tu terms. Louise is twenty and from Paris; Ana is from Brazil. Listen once for the age and once for each place, then take either role. Only the questions are marked informal because they use tu; the answers also work when someone asks with vous.

Try it, then check the four lines

Play a person who is thirty and from Brazil. Before looking at the examples, say your age and origin, then ask a friend their age and where they are from. Check the four lines below in that order and listen to each one.

To remember: age uses j'ai + number + ans; origin uses je suis de Paris or je suis du Brésil, with du = de + le. The two questions to take away are Quel âge tu as ? and Tu es d'où ?. For another round, change your age to twenty and your origin to Paris.

Practise this lesson