7A.1- Le Passé Composé Avec Être

Le Passé Composé Avec Être

If you recall, le passé composé is a past tense used to describe specific, completed actions.  Most of the time, AVOIR is used as the helping verb.  For some verbs, however, you cannot use AVOIR.  This post is dedicated to those verbs which take Être.

French students often learn the acronym "DR & MRS VANDERTRAMP" to memorize the short list of verbs which use Être as the helping verb.  Those verbs are illustrated in the image above.  Below, you will also see these verbs listed in acronym form.

If you look at the image above, you will see two columns.  The left-hand column shows the infinitive of the verb, while the right-hand column shows the past participle.  If you look closely, you will notice that for each of the past participles, there is "(e)(s)" which follow.    Do you remember seeing this when constructing the past particple of verbs which take AVOIR?  

Here's a little song to help you memorize them: 

The most important thing that you must realize when you construct statements in PC w/  Être: 

 PAST PARTICIPLE AGREES IN NUMBER AND GENDER WITH THE SUBJECT.  

STILL CONFUSED?!!!

OK-  Check out this video and see if it provides you with any clarity:

For further explanation and practice using pc with ETRE, try the following activities:

PC with ETRE

When you feel comfortable enough with this skill, give the following activity a try  this Pre Test .  Send me a pic of your results and let me know how it's going for you!