B. Participe Passé

The Passé Composé
I. The passé composé is a past tense. We use it in French to talk about events
that have a clear beginning and ending, for example:
Jacques a raté le bus.
Elle est tombée.
Jacques missed the bus.
She fell down.
We do not use the passé composé in French to indicate all events that occurred
in the past. For events that are more related to feelings or emotions, or
occurred over a longer period of time, we use another past tense, called the
imparfait (imperfect), for example:
Quand René avait six ans...
Elle était malade.
When René was six years old...
She was sick.
II. The passé composé consists of two parts: the verbe auxiliaire (helping
verb) and the participe passé (past participle).
A. Verbes Auxiliaires
French uses two verbes auxiliaires (helping verbs) with the passé composé.
They are: avoir and être.
1. Avoir
The verb avoir (to have) is conjugated in the following manner:
j’
tu
il
elle
on
ai
as
a
a
a
nous
vous
Ils
elles
avons
avez
ont
ont
participe passé: eu
Except for the occasions listed below under être, avoir is always the verbe
auxiliaire.
2. Être
The verb être (to be) is conjugated in the following manner:
je
tu
il
elle
on
suis
es
est
est
est
nous
vous
Ils
elles
participe passé: été
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sommes
êtes
sont
sont
Être is the verbe auxiliaire in the following instances:
a. When one of the following 16 verbs are used:
devenir
revenir
mourir
rentrer
sortir
venir
arriver
naître
descendre
entrer
rester
tomber
retourner
aller
monter
partir
for example:
Napoléon est né en Corse.
Corrine et Luc sont allés en France.
Napolean was born in Corsica.
Corrine and Luc went to France.
There is no logical reason for these 16 verbs taking être as the verbe
auxiliaire. You just have to remember them. Many people use this mnemonic:
the first letter of each verb spells out DR/MRS VANDERTRAMP.
b. When the verb is reflexive, for example:
Georges s’est couché à minuit.
Paulette et Guy se sont baignés hier.
Georges went to bed at midnight.
Paulette and Guy went swimming
yesterday.
c. Unlike with the verbe auxiliaire avoir, when être is the verbe auxiliaire, it
must agree with the subject. If the subject is:
masculine singular—add nothing
masculine plural—add ‘-s’
feminine singular—add ‘-e’
feminine plural—add ‘-es’
for example:
Paul went to the café.
Paulette went to the café.
Paul and Luc went to the café.
Paulette and Pauline went to the café.
Paul est allé au café.
Paulette est allée au café.
Paul et Luc sont allés au café.
Paulette et Pauline sont allées au café.
3. Negative Sentences
When a sentence in the passé composé is negative, the ne…pas (ne…jamais,
etc.) go on either side of the verbe auxiliaire, for example:
I didn’t see the monster.
We didn’t go to the movies.
She never drank alcohol.
Je n’ai pas vu le monstre.
Nous ne sommes pas allés au cinéma.
Elle n’a jamais bu d’alcool.
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B. Participe Passé
The participe passé (past participle) is the second part of the construction of the
passé composé. The participe passé is formed in this manner:
1. For –er verbs, the participe passé is formed by removing the final –er and
adding –é, for example:
parler parlé
danser  dansé
2. For –ir verbs, the participe passé is formed by removing the final –ir and
adding –i, for example:
finir fini
obéir  obéi
3. For –re verbs, the participe passé is formed by removing the final –re and
adding –u, for example:
descendre  descendu
vendre  vendu
4. Many participes passés are irregular. Here are some you should know:
avoir
boire
devoir
être
faire
mettre
mourir
eu
bu
dû
été
fait
mis
mort
naître
pouvoir
prendre
recevoir
venir
voir
vouloir
né
pu
pris
reçu
venu
vu
voulu
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III. Putting the passé composé into practice.
The passé compose is a compound tense and therefore has many
considerations, however, it is absolutely necessary to be able to talk about
events that occurred in the past. With a little practice you will find that it is not
that hard.
Think-Alouds
1. I want to say in French: I ate a good lunch.
The verb ‘to eat’ is ‘manger’
‘Manger’ takes avoir as its verbe auxiliaire
The subject of the sentence is ‘I’
‘I’ in French is ‘je’
The form of avoir that goes with je is ai 
J’ai
The participe passé of ‘manger’ is ‘mangé’ 
J’ai mangé
‘A good lunch’ is ‘un bon déjeuner’ 
J’ai mangé un bon déjeuner.
2. I want to say in French: She went to the zoo.
The verb ‘to go’ is ‘aller’
‘Aller’ takes être as its verbe auxiliaire
The subject of the sentence is ‘she’
‘She’ in French is ‘elle’
The form of être that goes with elle is est 
Elle est
The participe passé of ‘aller’ is ‘allé’ 
(Writing only)
The verb auxiliaire is être which must agree with the subject.
The subject is feminine singular, therefore we must add an ‘e’
Elle est allée
‘To the zoo’ is ‘au zoo’ 
Elle est allée au zoo.
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