How to Teach French Feelings and Emotions – A French Teacher’s Guide
Feelings and emotions are one of my favorite topics to teach beginners because students can start using the vocabulary right away.
The grammar is also fairly straightforward. When I introduce feelings and emotions, I start with one very simple structure:
être + adjective
Once students are comfortable with that, I introduce:
se sentir + adjective
I don’t try to teach everything about reflexive verbs at this point. I simply give students a useful formula they can use immediately.
Start With Être + Adjective
The easiest way to begin is with the verb être followed by an adjective.
Je suis heureux.
I am happy.
Tu es nerveuse.
You are nervous.
Il est fatigué.
He is tired.
Elle est triste.
She is sad.
Nous sommes contents.
We are pleased.
This is a great opportunity to reinforce something students have already learned: adjectives have to agree with the person being described.
So I don’t teach the vocabulary as isolated English-to-French translations.
I want students to immediately see the adjective as part of a sentence.
French Adjective Agreement with Être and Se Sentir – Ready-to-Use Lesson
Make Agreement Part of the Vocabulary Lesson
This topic gives students a lot of useful adjective agreement practice.
For example:
heureux / heureuse
nerveux / nerveuse
fâché / fâchée
déçu / déçue
épuisé / épuisée
inquiet / inquiète
But some adjectives don’t change between masculine and feminine:
calme
triste
enthousiaste
malade
That makes feelings and emotions a nice way to review adjective agreement without making the entire lesson about adjective agreement.
I want students to get into the habit of thinking:
Who am I describing?
Then:
What form of the adjective do I need?
Teach the Être Conjugation First
Before adding a huge vocabulary list, I make sure students can produce the basic structure with all of the subject pronouns:
Je suis + adjective
Tu es + adjective
Il est + adjective
Elle est + adjective
On est + adjective
Nous sommes + adjective
Vous êtes + adjective
Ils sont + adjective
Elles sont + adjective
Once that pattern is comfortable, students can plug different adjectives into it.
For example:
Je suis énervé(e).
Tu es inquiet/inquiète.
Elle est heureuse.
Nous sommes fatigués.
Ils sont déçus.
The grammar stays the same. Only the adjective changes.
French Emotions and Feelings – Descriptive Adjectives – PowerPoint Jeopardy Game
Then Introduce Se Sentir
Once students are comfortable saying how someone is using être, I introduce another very French way to express feelings:
se sentir
I explain that se sentir means to feel.
For now, I don’t launch into a complete lesson on reflexive verbs.
I simply give students the formula:
subject + reflexive pronoun + sentir + adjective
For example:
Je me sens heureux.
I feel happy.
Tu te sens nerveuse.
You feel nervous.
Il se sent triste.
He feels sad.
Nous nous sentons fatigués.
We feel tired.
This is a good place to tell students that they don’t need to understand everything about reflexive verbs yet. Just learn and memorize this structure as a useful formula. They’ll see it again and feel kind of familiar with it when we study reflexive verbs more formally.
I find that this makes the introduction much less intimidating.
Teach the Two Structures Side by Side
Rather than giving students one long list of vocabulary to memorize, I have them practice the same adjective with both structures.
For example:
ÊTRE:
Je suis énervé(e).
SE SENTIR:
Je me sens énervé(e).
Then:
ÊTRE:
Tu es anxieux/anxieuse.
SE SENTIR:
Tu te sens anxieux/anxieuse.
And:
ÊTRE:
Elle est ravie.
SE SENTIR:
Elle se sent ravie.
This lets students see that the adjective doesn’t change simply because we’re using se sentir.
What changes is the structure before it.
Don’t Try to Teach the Entire Vocabulary List at Once
There are a lot of possible feelings and emotions in French.
Students don’t need to memorize 40 or 50 adjectives in one lesson.
I usually select a manageable group of very useful words and then recycle them throughout the lesson.
For example:
heureux / heureuse — happy
triste — sad
fâché / fâchée — angry
énervé / énervée — annoyed
inquiet / inquiète — worried
fatigué / fatiguée — tired
déçu / déçue — disappointed
surpris / surprise — surprised
content / contente — pleased
seul / seule — alone
Once students can use the structure comfortably, I add more vocabulary.
I Like to Practice the Same Adjective With Different People
This is a simple exercise, but it gives students a lot of useful repetition.
For example, I might give them:
happy — heureux / heureuse
Then ask them to produce:
Je suis heureux/heureuse.
Tu es heureux/heureuse.
Elle est heureuse.
Nous sommes heureux/heureuses.
Ils sont heureux.
Now students are practicing three things at the same time. They have the verb être, adjective agreement, and feelings vocabulary.
You can do the same thing with se sentir once students are ready.
Then I Mix Être and Se Sentir
Once students understand both structures, I like giving them a choice.
For example:
I am nervous. → Je suis nerveux/nerveuse.
I feel nervous. → Je me sens nerveux/nerveuse.
Or:
They are disappointed. → Ils sont déçus.
They feel disappointed. → Ils se sentent déçus.
This is much more useful than having students simply memorize two conjugation charts.
They’re learning to recognize which structure they need and then build the sentence.
Use Questions to Turn the Vocabulary Into Conversation
This is a topic that lends itself naturally to speaking practice.
Once students know the structures, I start asking questions such as:
Comment tu te sens ?
How do you feel?
Tu es fatigué(e) ?
Are you tired?
Tu es content(e) aujourd’hui ?
Are you happy today?
Pourquoi tu es énervé(e) ?
Why are you annoyed?
Students can answer with the structures they’ve already practiced:
Je suis fatigué(e).
Je me sens bien.
Je suis content(e).
Je me sens un peu nerveux/nerveuse.
That gives the vocabulary an actual communicative purpose.
A Few Things I Watch For
There are a few predictable problems I watch for with beginners.
Forgetting adjective agreement
Students may learn:
heureux = happy
and then use heureux for everyone.
I keep bringing them back to the person being described.
Elle est heureuse.
Elles sont heureuses.
Forgetting the reflexive pronoun
Once we introduce se sentir, students may say:
Je sens heureux.
I remind them that we’re learning the complete formula:
Je me sens heureux/heureuse.
The little word me is part of the structure.
Trying to conjugate sentir like a regular verb
Students may want to say:
Je me sens
but then struggle with the other forms.
I don’t make this more complicated than it needs to be at first. I give them the complete forms they need:
je me sens
tu te sens
il/elle/on se sent
nous nous sentons
vous vous sentez
ils/elles se sentent
Then we use them in actual sentences.
My Teaching Sequence for French Feelings and Emotions
When I teach this topic, I generally follow this progression:
1. Introduce feelings as adjectives.
2. Teach être + adjective.
This gives students the simplest way to express how someone is.
3. Review adjective agreement.
Make students pay attention to who they’re describing.
4. Introduce se sentir + adjective.
Teach it as a useful formula without getting into the entire reflexive-verb lesson.
5. Practice ÊTRE and SE SENTIR side by side.
This is where I find the comparison really helps.
6. Add more feelings vocabulary gradually.
Don’t make students memorize a giant list all at once.
7. Move into questions and conversation.
Give students opportunities to actually talk about how they feel.
French Feelings and Emotions Resources for Teachers
Feelings and emotions are a great vocabulary topic because students can use the language immediately, but they also provide an opportunity to reinforce être, adjective agreement, and eventually reflexive verbs.
I’ve created resources to give students structured practice with French feelings and emotions, including the vocabulary and sentence structures they need to talk about how they feel.
French Adjective Agreement with Être and Se Sentir – Ready-to-Use Lesson
French Emotions and Feelings – Descriptive Adjectives – PowerPoint Jeopardy Game
French Emotions and Feelings Adjectives – Reading, Writing, Speaking, Listening
I find that the most effective approach is to keep the grammar manageable at first. Être + adjective gives beginners an easy starting point, and se sentir + adjective gives them another very useful way to express themselves once that foundation is comfortable.
