Le professeur corrige doucement l'accent de ses étudiants.

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Breakdown of Le professeur corrige doucement l'accent de ses étudiants.

• corriger: to correct
• ses: his
• le professeur: the teacher

Questions & Answers about Le professeur corrige doucement l'accent de ses étudiants.

Why does the sentence start with Le professeur and not just Professeur or Un professeur?

In French, you almost always need an article (or another determiner) before a singular countable noun.

• Le professeur = the teacher/professor (a specific one, or one that is known in context, or sometimes "the" in a general sense: "the teacher" as a type of person).
• Un professeur = a teacher/professor (any one; not specified).
• Just Professeur (without an article) is not grammatical here in standard French. You might see it used as a form of address (e.g. a student calling: Professeur !), but not as the subject of a normal sentence.

So Le professeur corrige… is the natural way to say The teacher corrects….

Is professeur masculine or feminine? Can you say la professeure?

Traditionally, professeur is a masculine noun in French, even when talking about a woman:

• Le professeur est très sévère.
  (Could refer to a man or a woman.)

Modern usage sometimes allows a specifically feminine form:

• La professeure (increasingly accepted, especially in Canada and in France’s official recommendations)
• Informally, people also say la prof (short for professeur, and prof can be masculine or feminine depending on the article).

In this sentence, Le professeur is grammatically masculine, but it doesn’t necessarily tell you if the person is a man or a woman unless the wider context indicates it.