Verb drill
Se barrer, piger, causer: practise French verb frames
Practise familiar French verbs with their pronouns, objects and prepositions. Complete se barrer, piger, bosser sur and causer avec in short drills.
- B1
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In short
Learn a familiar verb with its frame: se barrer for leaving, piger quelque chose for understanding, causer avec quelqu’un for chatting. Keep the pronoun and the complement. Barrer une phrase means crossing a sentence out; causer un retard means causing a delay.
Yellow the idea to rememberBlue French to learn
| Frame | Example | Meaning here |
|---|---|---|
| se barrer | Je me barre après la réunion. | leave; familiar, sometimes blunt |
| barrer une phrase | Je barre cette phrase. | cross out; ordinary literal use |
| piger une règle | Je pige la consigne. | get / understand; familiar |
| bosser sur un projet | Je bosse sur ma présentation. | work on; familiar |
| causer avec quelqu’un | Je cause avec Nora. | chat with; familiar |
| causer un retard | Ce changement cause un retard. | cause; ordinary causal meaning |
For a chat, you can add the topic with de: Je cause avec Nora de notre projet. For understanding, the object comes directly after piger: Je pige cette règle. The neutral alternatives are parler avec Nora de notre projet and comprendre cette règle.
What do se barrer, piger and causer mean?
Je pige la règle. Nous pigeons la règle.
I get the rule. We get the rule.
Keep the e in pigeons to preserve the soft g sound.
Je me barre. Nous nous barrons. Je me suis barrée.
I’m leaving. We’re leaving. I left.
The last example is spoken by a woman. The masculine written form is je me suis barré.
The departure expression uses être in the compound past: elle s’est barrée, ils se sont barrés. Keep the subject’s pronoun as well: je me, tu te, nous nous. When you change the subject, the pronoun and the verb form both need attention.
1 · Present tense: use the verb beside each pronoun
- je · piger
- nous · piger
- vous · bosser
- ils · causer
2 · Build the frame; follow the cue
- Je barre après la réunion. (reflexive pronoun: first person singular)
- Nous barrons après la réunion. (reflexive pronoun: first person plural)
- Elle bosse sa présentation. (work on a task)
- Nous causons Nora. (chat with a person)
- Nous causons de notre projet. → Nous de notre projet. (neutral verb meaning talk, present tense)
- Hier, je après la réunion. (leave, using the familiar reflexive verb in the compound past; either gender accepted)
The alternative follows the sense
Le prix comprend la préparation.
The price includes the preparation.
Here comprendre means include. Piger belongs to the understanding sense.
Keep the full negative if you need it: Je ne pige pas cette consigne is natural familiar vocabulary in a complete negative sentence. The choice of verb and the choice to omit ne are separate features. For tone comparisons with the same event held steady, use the related verb-pair page.