A mystery: perfect and imperfect tenses together
Lesson details
Learning outcome
I can use the perfect and imperfect tenses together to describe simultaneous events in the context of a mystery.
Vocabulary and transcripts for this lessons
Key learning points
- The singular forms of ‘voir’ in the present tense are ‘vois’ (‘je’, ‘tu’) and ‘voit’ (‘il’, ‘elle’).
- The verb 'voir' is used in many expressions in French like 'voir grand', 'rien à voir avec' and 'voir la vie en rose'.
- Use the imperfect tense to express the past continuous 'was -ing'.
- Use the perfect + imperfect tenses together with a conjunction to describe what happened when you were doing something.
Keywords
Imperfect tense - tense used to describe how things were or used to be in the past, or to say what was happening
Common misconception
The imperfect tense only describes what used to happen.
The imperfect tense describes what was happening and what used to happen and can be used with the perfect tense and a conjunction like 'quand' or 'pendant que'.
Teacher tip
This lesson could lead to a group work task where students play the different characters and come up with their own questions and answers for the mystery.
Licence
Lesson video
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Prior knowledge starter quiz
6 Questions
Q1.Which word or phrase means 'because of'?
Q2.Match the French and English.
colony
diversity
gender
mainland France
sex
century
Q3.Match the French and English.
to defend, defending
to obtain, obtaining
to speak, speaking
to participate, participating
to allow, allowing
to promise, promising
Q4.Order the words to say: 'he watched the programme until the end'.
Q5.Write in English: 'un concours annuel'.
Q6.Write in French: 'an African artist (f)'.
Assessment exit quiz
4 Questions
Q1.The imperfect tense is used to say ...
Q2.Match the French and English.
to think big
to have nothing to do with
to see life optimistically
Q3.Order the words to say: 'I had dinner while you were cleaning'.
Q4.Write in French: 'I see the staircase'.
To help you plan your 9 French lesson on: A mystery: perfect and imperfect tenses together, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs...
To help you plan your 9 French lesson on: A mystery: perfect and imperfect tenses together, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs.
The starter quiz will activate and check your pupils' prior knowledge, with versions available both with and without answers in PDF format.
We use learning cycles to break down learning into key concepts or ideas linked to the learning outcome. Each learning cycle features explanations with checks for understanding and practice tasks with feedback. All of this is found in our slide decks, ready for you to download and edit. The practice tasks are also available as printable worksheets and some lessons have additional materials with extra material you might need for teaching the lesson.
The assessment exit quiz will test your pupils' understanding of the key learning points.
Our video is a tool for planning, showing how other teachers might teach the lesson, offering helpful tips, modelled explanations and inspiration for your own delivery in the classroom. Plus, you can set it as homework or revision for pupils and keep their learning on track by sharing an online pupil version of this lesson.
Explore more key stage 3 French lessons from the Ongoing past events: imperfect tense unit, dive into the full secondary French curriculum, or learn more about lesson planning.