🇫🇷 French A2: vocabulary and grammar lists

Words for the body, hair and looks, illness and health, accidents, danger, the police and war, with a few phrases such as to break your arm, to get fit and to have a temperature.

Words for describing and comparing: qualities, colours, shapes, weight, speed and degree, and kinds and amounts, such as “rond”, “lourd”, “beige”, “argenté” and “le genre”.

Words of many kinds: linking adverbs such as “cependant” and “pourtant”, ways of saying how or how much, and nouns and verbs from “le roi” and “la licorne” to “le formulaire” and “prier”.

School and work: pupils, subjects, stationery, exams and grammar terms, then jobs, offices and colleagues, such as “la gomme”, “le diplôme”, “le stage”, “le chômage” and “la retraite”.

Everyday French phrases for conversation: greetings, wishes, replies, reactions and opinions, and the verbs of talking, such as “Bonne chance !”, “Je t'en prie.”, “Qu'est-ce qu'il y a ?”, “à mon avis” and “expliquer”.

Family members and in-laws, friends and people you know, with words for feelings and moods, and verbs such as to laugh, to cry, to hope and to worry.

Buildings and places in town, districts and avenues, and the words for saying where things are: “le bâtiment”, “la mairie”, “le coin”, “à côté de” and “autour de”.

Hobbies, sport, games, music, shows and the arts, such as “la natation”, “le match”, “la pièce de théâtre”, “le roman” and “l'exposition”.

Words and phrases for shops, prices and paying, for money and banking, and for clothes and accessories, with the verbs for selling, earning, borrowing, trying on and getting dressed.

The home and daily life: rooms, furniture and appliances, decorating, washing and cleaning, toiletries, renting and neighbours, such as “le canapé”, “le lave-linge”, “le shampooing”, “le loyer” and “faire la vaisselle”.

Meals, food and drink, tableware and cooking: “le plat principal”, “la confiture”, “les œufs brouillés”, “la nappe” and “commander”.

Times and dates, numbers and ordinals, weights and measures, and holidays: “minuit”, “bientôt”, “quatre-vingts”, “le kilo” and “Pâques”.

The weather, seasons, countryside and animals, compass points, regions, landscapes, countries and nationalities, such as “le nuage”, “le loup”, “la vallée”, “la côte” and “belge”.

Pronouns, determiners, prepositions, conjunctions and adverbs, such as “celui-ci”, “quelques”, “dès”, “donc” and “ailleurs”. These little words often have several translations, so they are practised as flashcards and you judge your own answer.

Phones, computers, the internet, post and the media, such as “le smartphone”, “l'écran”, “télécharger”, “le timbre” and “par téléphone”.

Everyday verbs for moving, carrying, keeping, cutting and filling things, and for making, replacing and noticing, such as “apporter”, “garder”, “remplacer” and “respecter”, with a few verb phrases such as “il vaudrait mieux faire”.

Vehicles and journeys, roads and traffic, hotels, camping and sights: “le vélo”, “le rond-point”, “la valise”, “la tente” and “le monument”.

The six futur simple forms of the A1 and A2 verbs, to recite aloud and check yourself: the irregular stems (ser-, aur-, fer-, ir-, pourr-, verr-), the stems in -iendr-, the spelling changes and twelve regular verbs.

The six imparfait forms of the A1 and A2 verbs, to recite aloud and check yourself: être, the one verb not built on nous, the stems in -y- and -gn-, the stems in -s- and -v-, the other irregular verbs and ten regular ones.

The three imperative forms of the A1 and A2 verbs, to recite aloud and check yourself: être and avoir, the -er verbs and aller without -s, the verbs whose imperative is their present, and the pronominal verbs (lève-toi).

The six passé composé forms of the A1 and A2 verbs, to recite aloud and check yourself: avoir with regular participles (j'ai parlé, j'ai dormi) and irregular ones (j'ai offert, j'ai reçu), être with the verbs of movement (je suis monté), and the pronominal verbs (je me suis assis).

The six present forms of the A1 and A2 verbs, to recite aloud and check yourself: être, avoir, aller and faire, the verbs in -oir, venir, tenir and prendre with their families, partir and ouvrir, dire, écrire and conduire, the other irregular verbs and 30 regular ones.

Giving a reason with parce que and à cause de, a purpose with pour, a result with donc and c'est pour ça que, and joining ideas with mais, alors, encore, en plus and et puis. Typical forms are « à cause du bruit », « pour ne pas être en retard » and « c'est pour ça que ».

Comparing and measuring in French: plus, moins and aussi … que, autant de, meilleur and mieux, the superlative le plus, de plus en plus, assez and peu. Also the feminine and plural of adjectives (sportive, nationaux), bel, nouvel, vieil, and the gender of nouns in -tion and -ment.

The forms of the A1 and A2 tenses typed one at a time: the present, the passé composé, the imparfait, the futur simple and the imperative of the irregular verbs, then tenses and verbs mixed (veux, voudrai, ai dû, tiendront).

The negations ne… plus, ne… rien and ne… personne (also in the passé composé: je n'ai rien dit), the short answers moi non plus and moi si, the exclamations quel ! que ! comme !, and the reading of inverted questions such as Où habitez-vous ?

Object pronouns placed before the verb: le, la, l', les (je le vois), me, te, nous, vous (il nous aide) and lui, leur (je lui parle), also before an infinitive and in the passé composé, and after the verb in orders (regarde-le).

Past participles in -i and -u (fini, attendu), the irregular ones (mis, dit, écrit, pu, reçu, né), the verbs with être and their agreement (elle est sortie), pronominal verbs (elle s'est levée) and the place of déjà, pas encore, bien and beaucoup.

More verbs in the present: nous croyons, j'offre, il tient, je suis (suivre), nous construisons, j'éteins. The imperative of être, avoir and pronominal verbs: sois, aie, soyez, lève-toi, ne te lève pas.

Joining two clauses with qui (subject), que or qu' (object) and où (place and time), then with a preposition and qui for people. Typical forms are « l'ami qui habite ici », « le livre que je lis », « la ville où j'habite » and « la personne à qui je parle ».

The small French words that sound alike and differ in a letter or an accent: a and à, ou and où, et and est, son and sont, on and ont. Each sentence asks for the right one, with strict accents.

Pronouns that replace a noun and agree with it: celui-ci, celle-là, le mien, la tienne, le nôtre, les leurs. Then tout, toute, tous, toutes with a noun, and on meaning we, they or someone, as in « tout le monde » and « On frappe à la porte ».

The futur simple of regular and irregular verbs (je parlerai, nous irons, il sera), quand and si with a future main clause (quand j'arriverai, s'il pleut, on restera), and the choice between aller + infinitive and the futur simple.

Telling what used to happen and how things were: parlais, finissions, étais, il faisait, il y avait, then the choice between the passé composé and the imparfait in a short story in the past.

How often, where and when in French: souvent, parfois, rarement, près de, en face de, au bord de, en haut, en bas, depuis, il y a, pendant, dans, à partir de, jusqu'à, then d'abord, puis, enfin and the ordinals in -ième.

The little word between a verb or an adjective and what follows: arrêter de fumer, apprendre à nager, penser à ses vacances, servir à ouvrir, sans dire au revoir, content de, prêt à, différent de, fort en.

The pronouns y and en for a place or a quantity: j'y vais, vas-y, allez-y; j'en ai deux, j'en viens; then both in the negative and the passé composé (je n'y vais pas, j'en ai acheté).