Hover a line for its translation; hover a word for its meaning. Tap 🔊 to hear it.
Alex meets Lucie for the first time, and they talk about what they each do.
Job words take a feminine form where one exists: infirmier for a man, infirmière for a woman. As in Lesson 4, you drop the article: Je suis infirmière, not Je suis une infirmière.
How do I read these pronunciations? See the pronunciation guide.
1. Faire — je fais / tu fais
Faire covers both "to do" and "to make," and it turns up constantly. Tu fais quoi dans la vie ? is the everyday way to ask what someone does for work.
2. Qu'est-ce que — asking "what"
Qu'est-ce que is one fixed block meaning "what," placed at the front of a question with normal word order after it. In casual speech you can instead put quoi at the end — both appear in this dialogue.
3. Verbs that are not -er — lire, écrire, apprendre
Not every verb follows the -er pattern from Lesson 7. These four are worth learning by heart because you will use them daily: je lis, j'écris, j'apprends, je comprends. Their tu forms just add -s: tu lis, tu écris, tu apprends, tu comprends.
4. Chaque + singular noun
Chaque means "each" or "every," and the noun after it always stays singular — chaque jour, chaque semaine, never chaque jours.
A. Fill in the Blank · Complétez
Fill in the blank with a word from this lesson's vocabulary.
- 1.Tu quoi dans la vie ?you do
- 2.Je travaille dans un .hospital
- 3.J'apprends beaucoup jour.every
- 4.J'étudie à l'.university
B. Multiple Choice · Choix multiple
Choose the best answer.
- 1.How do you ask what someone does for a living?
- 2.Which is correct?
- 3.How do you say "I read books"?
- 4.How does Lucie say she is a nurse?
C. Rearrange the Sentence · Remettez dans l'ordre
Rearrange the words into a correct sentence, adding the punctuation shown in parentheses.
- 1.Tap tiles below…
- 2.Tap tiles below…
- 3.Tap tiles below…
- 4.Tap tiles below…
D. True or False · Vrai ou faux
Based on the dialogue, mark each sentence T (true) or F (false).
- 1.Lucie works at a hospital.
- 2.Lucie says her job is never hard.
- 3.Lucie reads and writes in her free time.
- 4.Alex understands everything in class.
E. Matching · Associez
Match each question on the left with the best response on the right.
F. Translation · Traduction
Translate items 1–2 into French, and items 3–4 into English.
- 1.I work in a hospital.
- 2.I learn a lot every day.
- 3.Qu'est-ce que tu fais de ton temps libre ?
- 4.Je comprends mieux chaque semaine.
Generate a brand-new dialog on any topic, using this lesson's 16 vocab words — plus any words you add below.
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What not to ask about work
Asking what someone does is normal in France. Asking what they earn is not — money is private, and the question lands badly even among friends. Work is also less central to identity than in English-speaking countries. The legal working week is thirty-five hours, five weeks of paid holiday is the statutory minimum, and August empties the cities as much of it is taken at once. A 2017 law gave employees a right to disconnect from work email outside working hours. The question in this lesson is safe; treating the answer as the measure of the person is not.