L'écran de mon ordinateur est très grand.

to be

Breakdown of L'écran de mon ordinateur est très grand.

• mon: my
• de: of
• l'ordinateur: the computer

Questions & Answers about L'écran de mon ordinateur est très grand.

Why is l'écran used instead of le écran?

In French, when the definite article le or la comes before a word beginning with a vowel (or mute h), you drop the vowel of the article and replace it with an apostrophe. This process is called elision. So le écran becomes l'écran to make pronunciation smoother.

What role does de play in l'écran de mon ordinateur?

The preposition de links two nouns in a possessive or descriptive relationship. Here it means “screen of my computer,” functioning like the English “of” or the ’s in “computer’s screen.”

Why do we say de mon instead of du or de l' before ordinateur?

• du is the contraction of de + le, and de l' is de + l' (before vowel) when you’re using definite articles.
• But mon is a possessive adjective, not a definite article. Possessives never contract with de, so you must say de mon ordinateur, not du mon or de l' mon.

Why is mon ordinateur using mon and not ma ordinateur?