Learning French Noun Genders is Hard

One of the most difficult challenges for non native speakers learning French is to remember the gender of nouns. In the French language each noun has a gender, masculin or feminin, and you must remember it so that you can use the correct article: un, une, le, la.

As native French speakers learn vocabulary they always learn the noun along with the article/gender so they just know it. If you’re learning French and you use the wrong gender it sticks out. You may not know you’ve made a mistake but the native French speaker will. It’s important to learn the genders.

Ok. So how can I learn

There are a number of strategies that people have come up with to learn the gender of French nouns using rules of thumb and generalities. Usually it’s a long list of word endings that are most often masculin or feminin that must be memorized.

If you memorize all the rules it’s conceded that it works possibly 80% of the time. Ultimately, though, the best thing is to just to memorize the gender for each individual noun so that you too just know.

There’s a better way

Introducing Un Une. Un Une is an iOS Apple app that allows you to practice the genders of French nouns. Learning such a vast amount of information is actually quite hard so Un Une uses a special technique that makes learning easy. You are presented new nouns at a pace that is right for you. In this way you can learn at an accelerated pace.

This is the main training screen.

Un Une presents you with a French noun. In this case “mois”.

You can tap M of F to choose a gender.

If you’re not sure you can tap ? and the gender will be displayed. (It’s better not to guess as there is a risk of memorizing the incorrect guesses)

If you’ve installed a French dictionary (in device settings) you can tap the dictionary button to get a definition.

After you’ve made your choice you’ll be shown if you’ve got it right.

… or if you’ve got it wrong.

The correct answer is highlighted in green so you remember the correct answer.

You can start training right away with the free word pack. You’re given 100 of the most common words. Give it a try and see how you do. You’ll probably start noticing the words in day to day use and have confidence that you know them.

The training passes through several phases where you will feel more and more confident with the current word pack. Once you feel you know them it’s time to move on.

Un Une allows you to purchase additional packs of 300 nouns. 150 feminin and 150 masculin. The earlier packs have the most common words. (More packs wil be added with time.)

Additionally for convenience of purchase and to save a bit you can buy Multi Packs.

Consistency is the key to learning. Un Une allows you to set reminders that will notify you that it’s time to do some Un Une training.

A stats screen lets you watch your progress.