I’ve written many lessons about relative pronouns. Maybe you’ve watched my lessons about them. Maybe you’ve done my exercises, dictées, practice cards and even taken classes with me, but you know what? I’m going to write about them again, because you really need to know how to connect clauses, and it’s not that hard once you know the rules.
Let’s focus on the four main relative pronouns: qui, que, où, dont. Whether you are brand new to this or if you just need a review, my video lessons are the best place to start (scroll down for videos).
I used to teach all four pronouns at the same time. I would introduce them all at once and just wait for my students to tell me how confused they were. It really wasn’t fun at all.
The frustration point was easy to identify. The problem was knowing when to use dont. It became my mission to find a solution to this problem, and I found it!!
I now teach dont all by itself before even mentioning the other pronouns. Problem solved. Most of my students these days tell me that dont is actually easier than the other ones.
Watch my YouTube video lessons in this order, and then you can follow up with my practice cards if you want to master these relative pronouns.
“This tutorial went above and beyond what is presently available on Youtube. I love the attention to detail and the helpful discussions between the differences in French and English.”
“I had a lesson for one hour trying to understand que, qui and où. But this video took only 13 minutes for me to understand even dont which I always avoided using because I just could not get it.”
Qui – This pronoun is used to refer to people and means “who” or “whom”.
Example: “La personne qui parle est mon ami” (The person who is speaking is my friend).
Que – This pronoun is used to refer to things and means “that” or “which”.
Example: “Le livre que je lis est intéressant” (The book that I am reading is interesting).
Où – This pronoun means “where” and is used to refer to a place.
Example: “Le parc où je vais est grand” (The park where I am going is big).
Dont – This pronoun is used to refer to possession and means “whose” or “of which”.
Example: “Le chat dont je parle est très joli” (The cat I am speaking about is very cute).
I hope my lessons have helped to clarify how and when French relative pronouns. It’s important to keep practicing. Before you know it you’ll be using them with ease in your conversations!
