In this lesson you will learn how to say to need in French. To say to need you must use the following grammatical construction: “avoir besoin de”. This literally means “to have the need of”. In order to make a proper sentence you must also conjugate the verb avoir.
In this video I will teach you how to say, “My cat needs a name”. I have had my little kitty for about eight months now and she still doesn’t have a name! To say this in French you say:
- Ma chatte a besoin d’un nom.
My cat needs a name; or - Elle a besoin d’un nom.
She needs a name.
My cat is female and the word for a girl cat is une chatte. Because I am saying, “my cat” I must say “ma chatte”. If he were a male I would say “mon chat” in the masculine form. The next thing I do is conjugate avoir in the third person, singular (a).
After the word besoin comes the word “de” which means “of”. The word for name in French is “nom”. I write “d'” un because begins with a vowel and it would be incorrect to write “de un” in French. Please watch the movie below and let me know if you have any questions.
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Example sentences
- J’ai besoin d’un café.
I need a coffee. - Tu as besoin d’aller aux toilettes.
You need to go to the bathroom. - Nous avons besoin d’étudier le Français.
We need to study French. - Les enfants ont besoin d’aller à l’école.
The children need to go to school. - Le professeur a besoin d’être sympatique.
The teacher needs to be nice. - Le chien a besoin de manger.
The dog needs to eat. - Tu as besoin de lire le journal.
You need to read the newspaper. - Elle a besoin de rentrer chez elle.
She needs to go home. - Nous avons besoin de cuisiner la viande.
We need to cook the meat. - The man needs to walk faster.
L’homme a besoin de marcher plus vite. - Vous avez besoin de parler plus lent.
You (plural) need to speak slower. - Nous avons besoin d’apprendre des langues étrangères
We need to learn foreign languages.
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If you've found this post useful you might want to considering looking at our post covering the best apps for learning French. We've looked a total 33 apps and have written comprehensive reviews of Rosetta Stone, Pimsleur and FrenchPod101.
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Bonjour! My name is David Issokson. I'm based in Victor, Idaho (near Jackson, Wyoming) and have helped hundreds of students to learn French online since 2013.
