Mon réveil n'a pas sonné aujourd'hui.

Questions & Answers about Mon réveil n'a pas sonné aujourd'hui.

Where do the negative words go when using the passé composé?
In the passé composé, the negative words ne and pas act like a sandwich around the helper verb (here, the verb avoir). So, they surround a to make n'a pas. The past participle sonné (rung) goes after pas.
Why is it written as n'a instead of ne a?
The first part of the negative is ne. Because the helper verb a starts with a vowel, the e in ne is dropped to make it flow better when speaking. So, ne a shrinks into n'a.
Why use mon for 'my' in this sentence?
In French, possessive words like 'my' match the gender of the object being owned, not the owner. Réveil (alarm clock) is a masculine word, so we use the masculine singular mon. Even if a woman is speaking, it remains mon réveil.
Why does aujourd'hui have an apostrophe in the middle?
The word aujourd'hui (today) is a historical mash-up of older French words that literally meant 'on the day of this day.' The apostrophe is a leftover from how those old words were glued together. You can just memorize it as one single vocabulary word!

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