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Ils ont libéré l'oiseau ce matin.

Ils ont libéré l'oiseau ce matin.
They freed the bird this morning.
From Lesson 83:Accent stem changes (é to è)·French

Questions & Answers about Ils ont libéré l'oiseau ce matin.

Since this lesson is about verbs that change é to è like libérer, why is there no è in ont libéré?
The change from é to è only happens in the present tense, like when saying ils libèrent (they free). This sentence is in the past tense. The past participle libéré is built directly from the infinitive, so the é doesn't change.
Why use two words (ont libéré) for "freed"?
French mostly uses the passé composé for completed past actions. It requires two parts: a helping verb (here, ont from avoir) and a past action word (libéré). Together, ont libéré translates to "freed" or "have freed".
The word oiseau has so many vowels! How do you pronounce it?
It looks tricky, but you can break it down. In French, oi sounds like "wa" and eau sounds like "oh". Because the s is trapped between two vowels, it makes a buzzing "z" sound. Put it all together and it sounds like "wa-zoh".
Why does the sentence use ce matin instead of le matin?
Ce is a pointing word that means "this" or "that" for masculine words. If you used le matin, it would just mean "the morning" in general. To specify "this morning", you must use ce.

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