#milkmanoffical

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hot socketBOT
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Please be patient

Our volunteers look into many questions every day; sometimes it takes them a little while to answer.

Pro tip: you can rename the thread title with `.tr <thread name>`

Make it descriptive, including relevant context, but also to the point. This way you improve your chances of getting a more relevant and specific answer.

crystal wagon
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Give it a try first :)

fair sentinel
crystal wagon
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Well I’ll give you some hints

teal reef
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salut

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hi

crystal wagon
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The first sentence is in the present so read this article
The second sentence is in the past, a defined action, so read this article.
The first sentence has the interrogative adverb ‘how’ which you can read about here.
The verbs you need to know:
to know = savoir (parler)
to teach/learn = apprendre

crystal wagon
teal reef
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Oh alright

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what channel can help me learn french?

crystal wagon
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Because I’m currently outside

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Like 2-3 hours later

crystal wagon
fair sentinel
crystal wagon
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Okay, I'm here so I can give you a breakdown

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My attempt would be:
« Comment est-ce que tu sais parler le français ? Est-ce que tu l'as appris seul ? Est-ce que tu l'as appris à l'école ? »

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Let's break this down one by one.
(1) Comment
This is the interrogative adverb meaning 'How'.
(2) est-ce que
This concerns the three main ways to ask questions in French. French, like English, uses inversion to ask a question. Inversion means that you reverse the position of the subject and the verb. It's not apparent in English if you use the present tense (How do you know…) but it's clearer with a compound like the present perfect : 'You've known French => How have you known French'. Notice how 'you' and 'have' switched places there. In English, we have something called do-support which facilitates this but French has « est-ce que ». Just insert it before your subject and that's it.
« Comment + tu sais parler => Comment est-ce que tu sais parler »
You can invert if you want, « Comment sais-tu parler … » but know that this construction is formal whereas « est-ce que » is neutral.
(3) tu sais (parler)
The verb 'to know' here describes your knowledge and skill in speaking French, for which we use the verb « savoir ». « savoir + verb » means 'to know (how to) verb'. For example: « Tu sais nager (You know [how] to swim) ». The verb here is conjugated which means that its form has been changed to agree with the person, number, and tense. « sais » here is in the present tense, second person singular. You know how in English we have 'I am' and 'she was'? That's the same idea: 'am' is the present tense, first person singular (I) whereas 'was' is the past tense, third person singular.
Now, why don't I conjugate « parler » too? Well, you only conjugate once per subject, that's core. Do you say, 'He likes to drink coffee' or 'He likes drinks coffee'? Same principle. Conjugate once per clause/subject.
(4) parler le français
Unlike English, French articles appear a lot more often; articles are 'the, a/an'. In English, you can get away with omitting it but in French, you have to include it.

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(5) Est-ce que tu l'as appris seul ?
I've already explained « est-ce que » so no worries on that front but what about « as appris »? In English, we have two main past tenses to describe actions, the simple past and the present perfect. The simple past describes something that happened in the past whereas the present perfect is similar but the consequences of what happened is still relevant to the moment of speaking. For example, take these two sentences:
'Yesterday, I went to the market.'
Here, we use the simple past because it's just something we did in the past, it's no longer relevant. So what?
'This morning, I've gone to the market.'
Here, we use the present perfect because, though it's still in the past, the consequences are still relevant because it's still morning.
In French, we only have one, the « passé composé », which covers both English tenses. It's formed just like the present perfect where we take our auxiliary verb – which is 'to have' in English and « avoir » in French – conjugate that in the present plus past participle. So, if you know your present « avoir » conjugations, you can form this. « J'ai appris, tu as appris, il a appris, etc ». Do note that in French, some verbs like « être (to be) » instead like « je suis parti (I left) ».

What about that « l' » bit before « as appris » ? In French and English, the sentence structure is Subject-Verb-Object but French object pronouns are Subject Object Verb. For example, if I were to say, 'I see Emma' in French, the structure is the same: « Je vois Emma ». However, if we switched to pronouns like 'I see her', the French translation has the object pronoun before the verb: « Je la vois ». Here, « le français » is masculine so we use « le ». Why is it « l' » and not « le » ? Because the next word starts with a vowel, the pronoun must elide/contract. In English, contractions are informal but in French, they're mandatory.

« seul » is an adverb meaning 'alone/by your own'.

fair sentinel
crystal wagon
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It's just that articles and words that end in a mute final E tend to elide if the next word starts with a vowel

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parce que + il = parce qu'il
la + eau = l'eau
me + a fait = m'a fait