Goals
What you'll be able to do- 📖 Discover Le Petit Nicolas, a classic of French children's literature
- 🎤 Understand testimonies about school memories and first jobs
- 📝 Tell your own school memories
- 📚 Use the passive voice across all tenses
- 📅 Tell depuis (a duration that's still going) from il y a (a moment in the past)
- 🎵 Distinguish the vowels [i], [a], [e] by ear
Discover · Le Petit Nicolas
A French children's classic📚 Who is Le Petit Nicolas? A series of short stories about an irrepressible French schoolboy and his classmates (Rufus, Alceste, Maixent, Agnan, Clotaire…) — the French equivalent of Dennis the Menace or Calvin and Hobbes in cultural status. Created in 1959, the books have been read by virtually every French child since. The stories are short, funny, and written in the playful first-person voice of a 7-year-old, which makes them ideal A2-level reading material.
Le Petit Nicolas
1959-2026 · Le Petit Nicolas has been making us laugh for 67 years!
Le Petit Nicolas was created 67 years ago by two men: René Goscinny, who wrote the texts, and Jean-Jacques Sempé, who drew the illustrations.
📅 A few key dates:
💡 Notes
- Le Petit Nicolas nous fait rire depuis 50 ans ! — faire + infinitive = "to make (someone) do something" / "to cause the action": faire rire "to make laugh", faire pleurer "to make cry", faire travailler "to make work". Same construction as English "make + bare infinitive".
- il y a 50 ans = il y a + duration → "50 years ago". A specific moment in the past, completed.
- 650 000 livres vendus — vendus is the past participle of vendre, used here as an adjective (= "that have been sold"). This is a passive construction in disguise.
- Vous faites rire mon fils. Il est tout content ! — tout intensifies the adjective (= "totally", "completely"). Like English "all" in "he's all happy".
1.1 · Who is Le Petit Nicolas?
- What year was Le Petit Nicolas created?
- Who wrote the texts?
- Who drew the illustrations?
- What's the main theme of the stories?
- Why do these stories still appeal to people?
- Are these books just for children?
1.2 · Testimonies · School memories & first jobs
1.2.1 · Document 1 · Do you have happy school memories?
Based on Document 1, decide whether each person gives a positive, negative, or both answer.
- Person 1 — memory of friends and recess:
- Person 2 — memory of a strict teacher:
- Person 3 — memory of math being hard:
1.2.2 · Document 2 · First job
What was each person's first job and where did they work?
- Person 1 — first job:
- Person 2 — first job:
- Person 3 — workplace:
Vocabulary
Words to remember| French | Type | English |
|---|---|---|
| l'accueil | n.m. | welcome; reception; homepage |
| automatiquement | adv. | automatically |
| bizarre | adj. | weird, strange |
| un copain / une copine | n. | buddy, friend |
| depuis | prep. | since, for (with present) |
| inédit(e) | adj. | previously unpublished |
| un jouet | n.m. | toy |
| un lycée | n.m. | high school (final 3 years) |
| les mathématiques | n.f. pl. | mathematics |
| au moment où | phrase | at the moment when, just as |
| paraître | v. | to appear; to be published; to seem |
| particulièrement | adv. | particularly, especially |
| plaire (à qqn) | v. | to please (someone) |
| un prix | n.m. | prize; price |
| pour la première fois | phrase | for the first time |
| se présenter | refl. v. | to introduce oneself; to show up |
| rire | v. | to laugh |
| faire rire (qqn) | phrase | to make (someone) laugh |
| se souvenir de | refl. v. | to remember |
| un souvenir | n.m. | memory; souvenir |
| vendu(e) | adj. (p.p. of vendre) | sold |
| la récréation / la récré | n.f. | recess, break time |
| un instituteur / une institutrice | n. | primary school teacher |
| une matière (scolaire) | n.f. | (school) subject |
Conjugations · paraître, plaire, rire (present)
| paraître | plaire | rire | |
|---|---|---|---|
| je | parais | plais | ris |
| tu | parais | plais | ris |
| il/elle | paraît | plaît | rit |
| nous | paraissons | plaisons | rions |
| vous | paraissez | plaisez | riez |
| ils/elles | paraissent | plaisent | rient |
| p.p. | paru(e) | plu | ri |
⚠️ il paraît, il plaît — circumflex on the "î" in the 3rd person singular (pre-1990 spelling, still standard in most published books).
Grammar
How French works3.1 · The passive voice
The passive voice promotes the object of the action to subject position. The structure is largely parallel to English ("X was done by Y"):
subject + auxiliary être + past participle (+ par + agent)
📌 The past participle agrees with the subject (in gender and number) — this is the one big difference from English. Unlike English's invariable "was sold", French has vendu / vendue / vendus / vendues depending on what was sold.
| Tense | Active voice | Passive voice |
|---|---|---|
| Present | Le médecin soigne Marie. | Marie est soignée par le médecin. |
| Passé composé | Le médecin a soigné Marie. | Marie a été soignée par le médecin. |
| Imparfait | Le médecin soignait Marie. | Marie était soignée par le médecin. |
| Future simple | Le médecin soignera Marie. | Marie sera soignée par le médecin. |
| Near future | Le médecin va soigner Marie. | Marie va être soignée par le médecin. |
| Conditional | Le médecin soignerait Marie. | Marie serait soignée par le médecin. |
Examples from Le Petit Nicolas:
- Goscinny a écrit les textes. → Les textes ont été écrits par Goscinny. ("The texts were written by Goscinny.")
- Sempé a réalisé les dessins. → Les dessins ont été réalisés par Sempé.
- Le Petit Nicolas a été créé il y a 67 ans. ("Le Petit Nicolas was created 67 years ago.")
- Tous les billets d'avion ont été vendus. ("All the plane tickets have been sold.") — agentless passive, just like English.
⚠️ No agent? When you don't know or don't care who did the action, just drop the "par + agent" part: « Tous les gâteaux ont été mangés. » ("All the cakes have been eaten." — by whom? doesn't matter.)
3.2 · depuis vs il y a · The big anglophone trap
English collapses both into "for" / "since" / "ago", and the trap is using the wrong tense. French keeps them sharply separate:
| depuis | il y a | |
|---|---|---|
| Meaning | starting point of a situation that is still going on | a moment fixed in the past, finished |
| Tense | présent in French (= present perfect / present perfect continuous in English) | passé composé |
| English | "since" / "for" + perfect tense | "ago" + simple past |
| Example | Je travaille à Paris depuis 2003. = "I have been working in Paris since 2003." (still there in 2026) |
Il a publié son premier roman il y a 12 ans. = "He published his first novel 12 years ago." (in 2014, done) |
💡 Quick rule: depuis + present = it's still going / il y a + passé composé = it happened back then.
- J'ai habité à Paris pendant 5 ans. = "I lived in Paris for 5 years." (the 5 years are over, I'm not there anymore)
- Compare: J'habite à Paris depuis 5 ans. = "I have been living in Paris for 5 years." (still there)
Practice
Try it out4.1 · Ah, school… depuis or il y a? Pick the right one
- Je suis à l'école seulement un an et j'aime déjà les vacances.
- Elle a passé son bac cinq ans seulement.
- un mois, on s'amuse à imaginer notre vie d'écoliers.
- Je suis institutrice seulement deux ans et je me sens déjà épuisée.
- Vous étudiez la grammaire trop longtemps maintenant !
- Il a appris le français à l'école 22 ans.
4.2 · Passive voice · Transform Active → Passive
Rewrite each sentence in the passive voice. Watch the past-participle agreement.
- Goscinny écrit les textes. → Les textes par Goscinny.
- Sempé a réalisé les dessins. → Les dessins par Sempé.
- Les enfants lisent ce livre. → Ce livre par les enfants.
- Mes parents vont vendre la maison. → La maison par mes parents.
- Le professeur félicitait les bons élèves. → Les bons élèves par le professeur.
- L'éditeur publiera ces histoires. → Ces histoires par l'éditeur.
4.3 · A résumé · Samuel's CV Read & answer
Samuel Viala
shop assistant
25, rue Mansart · 75009 Paris
- Since 1994
- Shop assistant (FNAC, Paris)
- 1992-1994
- Shop assistant (BHV, Paris)
- 1991-1992
- Waiter (Banane Bar, Cannes)
- 1991
- Bac (Lycée Anatole-France, Loches)
Based on this CV, pick the right answer.
- In 2026, Samuel has been at the FNAC for:
- He got his bac:
- He was a waiter at the Banane Bar for:
- Passive: « Samuel a été par la FNAC en 1994. » (recruter = to recruit)
Communicate · School memories
Real-world task🗣️ With a partner
- How old were you when you started school?
- Do you remember your first day of school? When was it (use il y a)?
- Do you have happy memories of school? Why?
- Were the classes big? How many students?
- What were your favourite subjects? And the ones you hated?
- Did you do well at school?
- What did you want to be when you grew up?
- Was there a book, film, or TV show that made you laugh as a kid (something like Le Petit Nicolas for the French)?
💡 Use the imparfait for description (j'avais, j'étais, je voulais…) and the passé composé for specific actions (j'ai commencé, j'ai eu mon bac…).
Pronunciation · Telling [i], [a], [e] apart
Sharp vowels6.1 · Same or different?
Listen to the pairs of words and decide if they're identical (=) or different (≠).
- fait [fɛ] — fée [fe]
- chez — chez
- thé [te] — tais [tɛ]
- il y a — il y a
- il [il] — elle [ɛl]
- parais — parais
6.2 · [i], [a] or [e]?
Listen to the word and identify the stressed vowel.
- 🔵 [i] as in ami, lit, midi — like English "ee" in "see"
- 🟢 [a] as in papa, ta, là — bright open "a" (somewhere between "father" and "cat")
- 🟠 [e] as in thé, été, mes — closed "e", like the start of English "they" but pure (no glide)
- l'école
- fini
- papa
- été
- chat
- midi
📌 Pronunciation tip
▶︎ [i] — lips spread wide in a smile, tongue forward. Mi-mi-mi!
▶︎ [a] — mouth wide open. Ah!
▶︎ [e] — half-smile, lips slightly tense. Pure vowel — don't let it glide into [ɪ] like English "day" tends to. É-té.
▶︎ Watch out for [ɛ] (as in mais) — it's more open than [e] (as in mes). Like the difference between English "bait" and "bet".