--- title: Telling the time — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Telling the time», a lesson of the french course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: To ask the time in French you say Quelle heure est-il ?, and the answer is Il est trois heures, word for word "it is three hours", which simply means thre --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/) [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/) / Telling the time # Telling the time Lesson 12 of the french course of Mova's primary school: 14 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/12-telling-the-time/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/0/) — To ask the time in French you say Quelle heure est-il ?, and the answer is Il est trois heures, word for word "it is three hours", which simply means three o'clock. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/1/) — Heure is a feminine word, so one o'clock is une heure, and from two o'clock on it takes an s: deux heures. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/3/) — Picture a Paris station: the board says 14h30, because French timetables use the 24-hour clock; take 12 away and you know it is half past two in the afternoon. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/4/) — Noon and midnight have their own words, midi and minuit, and the day is split into le matin, l'après-midi and le soir. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/6/) — heure is feminine: Il est une heure (one o'clock) has no s; Il est deux heures (two o'clock) has an s. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/7/) — French timetables, cinemas and shops use the 24-hour clock written with h: 14h30 is quatorze heures trente, half past two in the afternoon. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/9/) — moins means minus: cinq heures moins le quart is quarter to five, cinq heures moins dix is ten to five. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/10/) — midi means noon and minuit means midnight; le Midi is also a name for the south of France. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/11/) — à + a time means "at": Le cours commence à neuf heures (the lesson starts at nine); neuf heures sounds like "nuh-VUR". - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/12/) — le matin is the morning, l'après-midi (after-midday) is the afternoon and le soir is the evening, from about 6 pm. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/13/) — Debout ! ("duh-BOO") means "Get up!"; word for word it means standing. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/14/) — À quelle heure ? means "At what time?"; in France dinner is often late, around 19h30 or 20h. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/15/) — With a clock face people often say trois heures moins vingt (twenty to three); with a digital clock deux heures quarante (2:40) is fine too. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/12-telling-the-time/16/) — Slang here: "like" at the end (Yorkshire) adds a shrug; "wee" (Northern Ireland) means small; "sure" (Ireland) starts a sentence; "y'all" (Texas) means you all; "ah'm no" (Scotland) means I'm not; "arvo" (Australia) means afternoon; "my lover" (Bath) means dear. - ← previous: [Dates and birthdays](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/11-dates-and-birthdays/) - next →: [Weather and seasons](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/13-weather-and-seasons/) - ↑ back to [French](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/french/)