Learn How to Conjugate Neiger (to Snow) in French

Learn How to Conjugate Neiger (to Snow) in French When you want to tell someone that its snowing in French, youll use the verb  neiger  (to snow). While this is a spelling change verb, which typically makes learning the conjugations a challenge, its also an impersonal one. That means you have far fewer words to memorize, which makes this lesson far easier than most. Neiger  Is an Impersonal Verb Neiger  is an  impersonal verb. This means that a person cannot do the act. It makes sense if you think about it: I cannot personally make it snow, you  cannot make it snow, and neither can we, she, he, or any other subject pronoun except it. This happens to verbs that we cannot control and youll find that  pleuvoir  (to rain) follows the same logic. What this means for French students is that you dont need to memorize the verbs conjugates for all of the pronouns other than  il, which means it in this circumstance. Also, there is no imperative form. The Essential Conjugations of  Neiger While you do have fewer forms of  neiger  to memorize than with personal verbs, you do need to look out for a few changes in its conjugations. This is a  spelling change  verb. You will notice that when the verb stem (neig-) requires an ending that begins with  a, an  e  is placed between the stem and the ending. This is done to retain the soft  g  so it sounds like gel rather than gold. The first chart gives you the proper forms for  neiger  in the indicative mood. While the present and future tenses use regular -er  endings, the spelling change is required in the imperfect past tense. The chart  will help you learn that  il neige  means it is snowing,  il neigera  means it will snow, and il neigeait  means it snowed. Present Future Imperfect il neige neigera neigeait You may also need to question whether it really is snowing, which is when  the subjunctive  is useful. If, however, it will only snow if something else happens (the temperature drops, perhaps), then youll use  the conditional.  In most cases, you will only find  the passà © simple  and  imperfect subjunctive  in written French. Subjunctive Conditional Passà © Simple Imperfect Subjunctive il neige neigerait neigea neigeà ¢t The Present Participle of  Neiger The present participle  of  neiger  does require the spelling change. Thats because it uses an -ant  ending and this produces the word  neigeant. Neiger  in the Compound Past Tense Beyond the imperfect, you may also use the  passà © composà ©Ã‚  to say that it has already snowed. This compound past tense requires neigers  past participle  neigà ©Ã‚  as well as a helping (or auxiliary) verb. To form this, begin by conjugating  avoir  to the il  present tense, then add  neigà ©:  il a neigà ©.