icon-background-square
New
New
Year 7

The person or a person? Singular definite articles 'le' and 'la'

Learning outcomes

I can use the definite article with singular nouns to talk about people.

I can recognise and pronounce [en/an]

icon-background-square
New
New
Year 7

The person or a person? Singular definite articles 'le' and 'la'

Learning outcomes

I can use the definite article with singular nouns to talk about people.

I can recognise and pronounce [en/an]

warning

These resources will be removed by end of Summer Term 2025.

Switch to our new teaching resources now - designed by teachers and leading subject experts, and tested in classrooms.

Lesson details

Vocabulary and transcripts for this lessons

Key learning points

  1. [en/an] sounds like ‘enfant’.
  2. Every noun has a gender: masculine or feminine. To say 'the', use 'le' for masculine and 'la' for feminine nouns.
  3. ‘Anglais’ and ‘français’ are also nouns meaning languages. We use an article with languages except after 'parler/en'.

Keywords

  • [en/an] - pronounced as in 'enfant'

  • (singular) definite article - the words 'le' and 'la', meaning 'the'

Common misconception

In French, like in English, there is only one way to say 'the'.

There is more than one word to say 'the' in French. For singular masculine nouns, use 'le', and for singular feminine nouns, use 'la'.

To make the most of listen and repeat speaking activities, teachers may consider a solo-duo-ensemble cycle whereby pupils say the phrases three times: once to themselves, once to a partner and once all together.
speech-bubble
Teacher tip
equipment-required

Equipment

copyright

Licence

This content is © Oak National Academy Limited (2025), licensed on
Open Government Licence version 3.0
except where otherwise stated. See Oak's terms & conditions (Collection 2).

Lesson video

Loading...

Some of our videos, including non-English language videos, do not have captions.

6 Questions

Q1.
Tick the words with the SSC [é/er/ez].
Correct answer: écouter
fenêtre
novembre
Correct answer: papier
parle
Q2.
Match the French verbs to the correct English translations.
Correct Answer:écouter,to listen, listening
tick

to listen, listening

Correct Answer:écrire,to write, writing
tick

to write, writing

Correct Answer:lire,to read, reading
tick

to read, reading

Correct Answer:parler,to speak, speaking
tick

to speak, speaking

Q3.
Match the correct parts of this important verb together.
Correct Answer:avoir,to have, having
tick

to have, having

Correct Answer:j',ai
tick

ai

Correct Answer:tu,as
tick

as

Correct Answer:il/elle,a
tick

a

Q4.
Identify the adjectives.
Correct answer: anglais
Correct answer: bon
ce/c'
Correct answer: français
qui
Q5.
True or false? To say 'a' in French, there is just the word 'un'.
Correct Answer: false, flase, fasle, faux
Q6.
Put the words below in the correct order to translate the following sentence into French: 'She's a nice friend and she's quite funny'.
1 - c'est une
2 - amie
3 - sympa
4 - et
5 - elle est
6 - assez
7 - amusante

6 Questions

Q1.
Match the French nouns below to the correct English translations.
Correct Answer:la fille,the girl
tick

the girl

Correct Answer:le médecin,the doctor
tick

the doctor

Correct Answer:le mot,the word
tick

the word

Correct Answer:la phrase,the sentence
tick

the sentence

Correct Answer:la personne,the person
tick

the person

Q2.
Which words contain [en/an]?
animal
Correct answer: danser
femme
Correct answer: français
médecin
Q3.
In French, the 'the' for singular masculine nouns is 'le' and the 'the' for singular feminine nouns is .
Correct Answer: la, 'la'
Q4.
True or false? 'Français c'est sympa' is a grammatically correct sentence.
Correct Answer: false, flase, fasle, faux
Q5.
Find the odd one out (the noun with a different gender to all the others).
actrice
chambre
fille
idée
Correct answer: portable
Q6.
Put the words below in the correct order to translate the following sentence into French: 'The (male) teacher is nice and the (female) singer speaks English'.
1 - le
2 - professeur
3 - est sympa
4 - et
5 - la
6 - chanteuse
7 - parle anglais

Additional material

Download additional material