Matching game
First or second? French ordinal words for finding your group
Find your assigned French group with premier, deuxième, troisième and dernier. Match position phrases and learn the gender endings that change.
- A1
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In short
Premier means first, deuxième second and troisième third. Dernier means last. For a feminine noun, use première and dernière: la première table, la dernière salle. Deuxième and troisième keep the same form with masculine and feminine nouns.
Yellow the idea to rememberBlue French to learn
At the start of a class, the teacher may assign you to a group by position rather than by a colour or a person’s name. Rejoignez le deuxième groupe tells you to join the second group. The ordinal word identifies a place in an order. It does not tell you how many people belong to that group.
| Position | Instruction | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rejoignez le premier groupe. | Join the first group. |
| 2 | Rejoignez le deuxième groupe. | Join the second group. |
| 3 | Rejoignez le troisième groupe. | Join the third group. |
| 4 of 4 | Rejoignez le dernier groupe. | Join the last group. |
Match the whole position phrase
Tap one on the left, then its partner on the right.
Look at the noun after the position
Groupe is masculine, so the first group is le premier groupe. Table is feminine, so the first table is la première table. The accent in première belongs to the feminine spelling. The same change appears in dernier and dernière. The nouns salle and personne are also feminine: la dernière salle and la première personne.
Je suis dans le premier groupe, à la deuxième table.
I’m in the first group, at the second table.
Deuxième and troisième already end in e in both genders. Keep them unchanged when moving from le deuxième groupe to la deuxième table. In a plural phrase, add s: les premiers groupes, les premières tables, les deuxièmes places. For finding your own place in a small class, the singular forms are the most useful starting point.
Last is a position, not a fixed number
If there are four groups, le dernier groupe is the fourth. If there are six, it is the sixth. You need to know the full order before turning dernier into a number. At a row of tables, the direction also matters. La première table à gauche gives you a starting point on the left. If the teacher points from the door, follow that direction rather than counting from where you happen to sit.