Telling time; day/month/season prepositions
Telling the time starts with il est + hour + heure(s) (never dropped): ...et quart (quarter past), ...et demie (half past), ...moins le quart (quarter to); il est midi/minuit take no heures. Add du matin / du soir, or the 24-hour clock (14 h 30). Prepositions: le + day = habitual (le lundi), bare day = one occasion; en + month/season (en janvier, en été), BUT au printemps. Days and months are never capitalised.
Daily routine uses reflexive verbs
Routine actions done to yourself use reflexive verbs: a pronoun (me/te/se/nous/vous/se) before a normally-conjugated verb. se réveiller → je me réveille, se laver → je me lave, s'habiller → je m'habille (elision). The pronoun changes with the subject (je me, tu te, il/elle se...) but the verb ending conjugates like an ordinary -er verb. Non-reflexive routine verbs stay plain: je prends le petit déjeuner, je quitte la maison, je dîne.
Drawn from real examiner reports.
Dropping the reflexive pronoun in the past
Reflexive routine verbs (se doucher, se lever) are a weak point once a sentence moves into the past. Two errors recur: dropping the pronoun (j'entends for je m'entends), and transforming person without keeping the verb reflexive or making the participle agree after être (elle s'est douchée, not douché). Perfect-tense agreement belongs to topic 1.4.
(s23 43 Q3(b) Task 2; w23 22 Q4(c))
Missing a time-frame marker
Extracts often put two time frames in one sentence — routine vs exception, or "then" vs "now". Weaker candidates answer from the first clause, missing a later marker that corrects it. Watch for d'habitude (usually) followed by mais aujourd'hui/ce jour-là (but today); the exception is often what the question asks. Read the whole sentence first.
(s22 Listening 11 Q19; 13 Q37)
quotidien(ne) and récemment vocab gap
Two everyday words derail otherwise-good answers: quotidien/quotidienne (daily) — not known even when candidates were asked about their routine quotidienne; and récemment (recently) — a PAST-tense cue that, unrecognised, makes candidates answer in the present and lose the time-frame match examiners reward. Build routine/time vocabulary alongside the grammar.
(s22 Speaking Topic 4 & 5)
journée = day, not journey
journée means "day" (the span of a day), a false friend for English "journey"; a trip is le trajet or le voyage — candidates describing a school day confused journée with the commute (le trajet). Also distinguish le matin/la matinée and le jour/la journée: the short forms mark a point ("in the morning"), the -ée forms stress the whole duration.
(s22 Speaking Topic 6)
au printemps and le lundi habits
Three small preposition/article traps: seasons take en (en été, en automne, en hiver) EXCEPT au printemps; a day with le is habitual (le lundi = every Monday) while the bare day is one occasion (lundi = this Monday); and days and months are NEVER capitalised in French (lundi, janvier), unlike English.
(general FL trap)
se lever stem change; s'habiller elision
Two spelling shifts in routine verbs: se lever is stem-changing — je me lève, il se lève (è) but nous nous levons (plain e); the accent appears only where the ending is silent. s'habiller elides before the vowel: je m'habille, never je me habille. The participle of lever stays regular: levé.
(general FL trap)
The reflexive pronoun is not fixed
Learners often treat the reflexive pronoun as fixed (se laver keeping se even for "I"). It isn't — the pronoun agrees with the SUBJECT: je me lave, il se lave, nous nous lavons. The infinitive shows se only as its citation form. A second error: assuming ALL routine verbs are reflexive — prendre le petit déjeuner, quitter la maison and dîner are ordinary.
(s23 43 Q3(b); w23 22 Q4(c))
Anchor every action with a time
Never leave a routine action floating with no time marker: anchor each one with a clock time (à sept heures) or a sequencing word (d'abord, ensuite, puis, après, enfin). It orders the day and is what the Speaking and Writing routine tasks reward.
Reflexive or plain routine verb?
Ask "am I doing this TO myself?" If yes, use a reflexive verb with a pronoun matching the subject (je me lève, elle se couche); if no, use an ordinary verb (je prends le petit déjeuner, je quitte la maison, je dîne).
Vary the tense on purpose
Mix tenses across a routine answer: present for "normally I...", perfect for "yesterday I...", near future (aller + infinitive) for "tomorrow I will...". Handling several time frames is what lifts the Range and Accuracy marks.
Read for the exception clause
A mais... or ce jour-là... after the routine often carries the actual answer — the exception, not the everyday habit. Don't stop at the first familiar word; read to the end and check whether a later clause changes the time frame or the fact asked about.
Describing your day is one of the most common Speaking and Writing tasks in 0520 — it needs clock times, days/months/seasons, and reflexive routine verbs working together.
Telling the time — always starts with il est + the hour + heure(s):
| French | English |
|---|---|
| Il est une heure. | It is one o'clock. |
| Il est trois heures et quart. | It is quarter past three. |
| Il est trois heures et demie. | It is half past three. |
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