How to say ‘I’m taking a French class’

Author: Camille Chevalier-Karfis

I hear many mistakes when students translate “I am taking a French class” in French. They tend to translate word by word from English, and unfortunately, it doesn’t work. I’ll give you many options to translate “French class” in French.

Mistake translating ‘French class’ in French

In French you cannot say ‘French class’. Your class is not French itself: it’s a class about the French language. ‘French class’ is an idiom in English.

So translating word by word and saying: “une classe française” is a mistake. Here is more about how to translate French in French in this article.

How To Translate ‘French class’ in French

When you say ‘a French class’, what you are really saying is a class about the French language.

a French class = a class of French language = une classe/un cours DE FRANÇAIS.

You could also say “une classe de langue française”, or use another way of translating ‘class’ : un cours de français, un cours de langue française…

The point of this article being to point out that you cannot say “un cours français” or “une classe française”.

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How to say ‘I’m taking a French class’

5 Ways To translate ‘I’m taking a French class’ in French

To translate the whole sentence, ‘I’m taking a French class’ is French you have several options:

  1. “Je suis un cours/une classe de français” (of the verb “suivre”: ‘to follow’)
    This is the most common way of saying ‘I’m taking a French class’ in French, albeit a bit formal.
  2. “Je prends un cours/ une classe de français”
    This is also very common
  3. “Je fais partie d’un cours/ d’une classe de français”
    I’m part of a French class
  4. “Je suis inscrit dans un cours/une classe de français”
    I’m registered in a French class
  5. “J’assiste à un cours/une classe de français”
    I follow a French class

In any case, to say “French” for a class, it’s “de français“, never “français/française”, which is my point :-)

More about how to translate French and France in French.

How to translate ‘I study French’ in French

To say ‘I study French’, here is what you can say:

  1. “J’étudie le français”
    I study French
    The name of the language is “le français”, and it’s masculine.
  2. J’étudie la langue française
    I study the French language
    “La langue” being feminine, the adjective “française” is also in the feminine.
Author: Camille Chevalier-Karfis

Camille Chevalier-Karfis

Born and raised in Paris, I have been teaching today's French to adults for 25+ years in the US and France. Based on my students' goals and needs, I've created unique downloadable French audiobooks focussing on French like it's spoken today, for all levels. Come to Paimpol and enjoy an exclusive French immersion homestay with me in Brittany.

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