SUMMARY

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• aujourd'hui = today

• hier = yesterday

• avant-hier = the day before yesterday

• dernier / dernière = last

• la semaine = week

• le mois = month

• le jour = day

• déjà = already / yet

• toujours = still / always

• pas encore = not yet

• il y a 3 jours = 3 days ago

• an(s) / année(s) = year(s)

• heure = hour

• minute = minute

• récemment = recently

• il y a longtemps = a long time ago

• ce matin = this morning

• ce midi = this "noon"

• ce soir = this evening / tonight

• cette nuit = this night / during the night

• hier matin = yesterday morning

• hier midi = yesterday at noon

• hier soir = yesterday evening

• hier dans la nuit = yesterday night/ during the night 

We have seen some vocab above, lots of which you can combine together to say what you want to say ! Here are some examples

• dernier / dernière

  • 1. • lundi dernier = last Monday

       • la semaine dernière = last week

       • l'année dernière = last year

       • en janvier dernier = last January

       • la nuit dernière = last night

• il y a [time unit]

  • 1. • il y a trois jours = three days ago

       • il y a deux mois = two months ago

       • il y a 5 ans = 5 years ago

• Ce / cette / cet
  ="this" but means "the last one" if followed by a past!

  • 1. • ce matin = this morning (the past part of it)

       • ce weekend = this weekend (last weekend)

       • cette nuit = this night (last night)

       • cette semaine = this month (the past part)

• hier  & avant-hier

  • 1. • hier matin = yesterday morning

       • hier soir = yesterday evening

       • avant-hier matin = the day before yesterday in the evening

       • avant-hier soir = the day before yesterday in the evening

ATTENTION: Even if they are just one word like "hier", those expressions are adverbial clauses in themselves, not just adverbs. It means that they go at the beginning of the sentence followed by a comma, or at the end of the sentence.

• J'ai mangé ce matin.
  I ate this morning.

• Hier matin, il a mangé.
  Yesterday morning, he ate.

• ça te plait ? = you like it?

• ça t'a plu ? = you liked it?

• ça te plaisait ? =  you were liking it?

• ça va te plaire ? = you're going to like it?

The verbe "plaire" means "to please".

Remember the expression "s'il te plaît" / "s'il vous plaît"?
We usually translate it as juste "please". But literally, it means "if it pleases you".

French has a few expressions like this, where the grammatical subject in the English expression becomes the object in the French one and vice versa.

• tu me manques = you are being missed by me = I miss you

• la musique me plait = the music is pleasing to me = I like the music

We haven't yet seen indirect object pronoun ("to me" instead of just "me" - program of 2010), but you can learn this expression already, as it is a useful one shen asking about a past event :)

• ça m'a plu = I liked it

• ça t'a plu = you liked it

• ça lui a plu = he/she liked it  (no gender distinction)

• ça nous a plu= we liked it

• ça vous a plu = you liked it

• ça leur a plu = they liked it  (no gender distinction)

DO NOT CONFUSE:  "ça t'a plu" with "il a plu", which means "it rained".... "plaire" and "pleuvoir" have the exact same participe passé: plu. You have to use context to know which one is meant: to please or to rain ? :D