Breakdown of Il faut récompenser le chien quand il joue bien.
il
he
le chien
the dog
bien
well
jouer
to play
quand
when
falloir
to be necessary / must (impersonal)
récompenser
to reward
Questions & Answers about Il faut récompenser le chien quand il joue bien.
How would I change "You must reward the dog" to the imperative command "Reward him!"?
You would say Récompense-le ! As you are learning in this lesson, affirmative commands attach the direct object pronoun (le) to the end of the verb with a hyphen. Also, remember that for regular -er verbs like récompenser, you drop the final -s for the tu command form.
Why does the sentence use Il faut to mean "You must"? Doesn't il mean "he"?
Il faut is a special impersonal expression meaning "it is necessary" or "one must." The il here is like the "it" in "it is raining," not a person. It is often translated as a general "you must." If you wanted to tell a specific person "you must," you would use Tu dois.
Why is récompenser left in its infinitive (dictionary) form?
Whenever you use il faut to say what needs to be done, the action verb that follows it is always in the infinitive form. You can think of it as literally translating to "It is necessary to reward."
Why use il for the dog in quand il joue bien?
In French, pronouns for animals and objects always match their grammatical gender. Because le chien is a masculine noun, you refer back to it with il, even though in English we often say "it."
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