--- title: Dates and birthdays — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Dates and birthdays», a lesson of the french course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: A French date is a little recipe: le, then the number, then the month, so the 14th of October is le quatorze octobre. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [French](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/) / Dates and birthdays # Dates and birthdays Lesson 11 of the french course of Mova's primary school: 15 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/0/) — A French date is a little recipe: le, then the number, then the month, so the 14th of October is le quatorze octobre. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/1/) — Only the first day of a month is special: it is le premier mai (the first of May), but after that just plain numbers, le deux mai, le trois mai. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/2/) — France writes dates day first, like the UK, so 05/03 is the 5th of March; an American reading it as May 3rd would send a birthday card two months late. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/3/) — At a French birthday party the tune is the same as "Happy birthday", but the words are Joyeux anniversaire, and someone shouts Souffle les bougies ! (blow out the candles!). - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/6/) — France writes dates day/month/year, like the UK; in the US the month comes first, so 05/03 means 5 March in France but May 3rd in the US. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/8/) — The answer pattern is Mon anniversaire, c'est le + number + month: Mon anniversaire, c'est le douze juin. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/9/) — Bon anniversaire ! is the usual "happy birthday", and Joyeux anniversaire is what people sing, to the same tune as in English. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/10/) — Souffle les bougies ! means "Blow out the candles!"; une bougie is a candle and un gâteau d'anniversaire is a birthday cake. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/11/) — Years are said as whole numbers: 2026 is deux mille vingt-six; mille (thousand) never takes an s. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/12/) — Many French calendars give a saint's name for each day, and on your name's day people may say Bonne fête ! (happy name day); Saint Charles is on 4 November. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/13/) — Quelle est la date aujourd'hui ? means "What's the date today?"; a full answer is C'est le quatorze octobre, or with the day, C'est mardi quatorze octobre. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/14/) — J'ai eu dix ans hier ! means "I turned ten yesterday!"; learn it as a set birthday phrase. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/15/) — Bonne année ! ("bo-na-NAY") means Happy New Year and is said all through January the first time you see someone; New Year's Eve is la Saint-Sylvestre. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/16/) — Months take a small letter in French: le dix février, le vingt novembre. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/17/) — Slang here: "bro" means mate; "mint" (North of England) means great; "our kid" (Liverpool) means my brother; "grand" (Ireland) means fine or good; "eh" (Canada) asks you to agree; "proper job" (West Country) means great; "posh" means fancy. - ← previous: [Days of the week and months](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/10-days-of-the-week-and-months/) - next →: [Telling the time](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/) - ↑ back to [French](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/)