Log inSign up

Mon père va au magasin avec mon fils et ma fille.

Mon père va au magasin avec mon fils et ma fille.
My father goes to the store with my son and my daughter.
Elon.io is an online learning platform
We have an entire course teaching French grammar and vocabulary.

Start learning French now

Questions & Answers about Mon père va au magasin avec mon fils et ma fille.

Why is it mon père and not ma père?

Because père is a masculine singular noun in French.

French possessive adjectives change to match the noun being possessed, not the owner:

  • mon = my + masculine singular noun
  • ma = my + feminine singular noun
  • mes = my + plural noun

So:

  • mon père = my father
  • ma mère = my mother
  • mes parents = my parents
Why do we say ma fille but mon fils?

For the same reason: the possessive adjective matches the gender and number of the noun.

  • fils is masculine, so: mon fils
  • fille is feminine, so: ma fille

This is very different from English, where my never changes.

What does va mean here?

Va is the third-person singular present form of the verb aller, which means to go.

The present tense of aller is:

  • je vais = I go / I am going
  • tu vas = you go / you are going
  • il/elle/on va = he/she/one goes / is going
  • nous allons = we go / are going
  • vous allez = you go / are going
  • ils/elles vont = they go / are going

So Mon père va... means My father goes... or more naturally in English, My father is going...

Why is it au magasin instead of à le magasin?

Because in French, à + le contracts to au.

So:

  • à + le = au
  • à + les = aux

That means:

  • au magasin = to the store / to the shop
  • aux magasins = to the stores / shops

You cannot normally say à le magasin in standard French.

What does magasin mean exactly? Does it mean magazine?

No. Magasin is a false friend for English speakers.

  • magasin = shop / store
  • magazine = magazine in English

So au magasin means to the store or to the shop, not to the magazine.

Why is there no word for the before mon fils and ma fille?

Because French usually uses a possessive adjective instead of an article in this kind of phrase.

So French says:

  • mon fils = my son
  • ma fille = my daughter

Not:

  • le mon fils
  • la ma fille

The possessive already does the job that my does in English.

Why is mon repeated before fils and ma repeated before fille? Why not just say it once?

In French, you normally repeat the possessive adjective before each noun:

  • mon fils et ma fille

This is the natural French structure because each noun has its own gender:

  • fils → masculine → mon
  • fille → feminine → ma

In English, we can often say my son and daughter, but French usually prefers to repeat the possessive: mon fils et ma fille.

Does avec simply mean with?

Yes. Avec means with.

So:

  • avec mon fils et ma fille = with my son and my daughter

It shows accompaniment: the father is going together with them.

Is the word order in this sentence normal French word order?

Yes. The sentence follows a very common French pattern:

Subject + verb + place + accompaniment

So here:

  • Mon père = subject
  • va = verb
  • au magasin = where he is going
  • avec mon fils et ma fille = who he is with

This is quite close to English word order, which makes this sentence relatively easy for English speakers.

How is père pronounced, and why does it have an accent?

The accent in père is a grave accent: è.

It helps show the pronunciation of the vowel.
père is pronounced roughly like pehr.

The accent is important because French spelling often uses accents to mark vowel quality. Even if learners do not fully master pronunciation yet, it is important to keep the accent in writing:

  • père = father
  • mere is not correct French spelling for this word
How is the whole sentence pronounced?

A simple approximate pronunciation for English speakers is:

mohn pair vah oh mah-gah-zan ah-vek mohn fees ay mah fee

A few notes:

  • mon sounds nasal; the n is not fully pronounced like in English.
  • père sounds like pair.
  • va sounds like vah.
  • au sounds like oh.
  • fils is pronounced fees.
  • fille sounds like fee-yuh or more simply fee with a light y sound in many learner approximations.
Could au magasin mean at the store instead of to the store?

In this sentence, with aller (to go), au magasin means to the store.

That is because aller à expresses movement toward a place:

  • aller au magasin = to go to the store

If you wanted to say at the store, you would normally use a different expression, such as:

  • être au magasin = to be at the store

So the verb helps determine the meaning.

Why is it et before ma fille?

Et simply means and.

So:

  • mon fils et ma fille = my son and my daughter

It joins the two nouns in the same way and does in English.

Can this sentence also be understood as My father goes to the shop with my son and daughter?

Yes, but French is more explicit here because it says:

  • mon fils = my son
  • ma fille = my daughter

A more literal translation is:

My father is going to the store with my son and my daughter.

In natural English, you might shorten that to:

My father is going to the store with my son and daughter.

But in French, repeating the possessive is normal and often preferred.