Sometimes numbers like cent (hundred) and quatre-vingts (eighty) take an S at the end, but other times they don't. Others, like mille (thousand), never take one. Sophie and Patrice explain these and other rules of writing numbers in French in this video.

It took two hundred years to standardize French spelling before it could be taught in schools using a method called la dictée (dictation), in which a student writes out the words he or she hears. As a matter of fact, this is the exact same principle behind Yabla's Scribe game!

Patricia explains the importance of dictation exercises for learning French. Now an essential teaching tool in the classroom, dictation was originally a pastime for French nobility. The author Prosper Mérimée created a dictation exercise for Empress Eugénie that stumped even the brightest intellectuals. Think you can beat them? Try it yourself here.

Patricia explains the multiple benefits of dictation exercises. Having fallen out of favor in recent years, dictation is making a comeback after the French Ministry of Education realized that language skills were deteriorating. Why not take full advantage of Yabla's Scribe game to improve those skills?

Victor Hugo is best known for his novels The Hunchback of Notre-Dame and Les Misérables, but he also wrote numerous poems. In this video, Patricia reads an excerpt from his poem "À l'Arc de Triomphe," in which he pays tribute to the city of Paris.

Amal and Caroline don't always see life through rose-tinted glasses (voir la vie en rose). Sometimes they have the blues (broyer du noir). This video gives you the opportunity to explore some interesting idiomatic expressions using colors.

Using her favorite fruits as examples, Patricia demonstrates some different ways of saying you "like" or "love" something in French.

Patricia will teach you how to say that you don't like something in tactful ways and in more direct ways. There are many interesting expressions to convey dislike, even disgust, but you might want to save some of them for private conversations.

Marie is writing a love letter and she's having trouble with plural endings. Luckily, Jeremy is there to help.

Marie needs help writing a love letter. Like many French learners and even native speakers, she has trouble with plural endings. You might be surprised to find out who the lucky recipient of this love letter is...

In this video you will learn how to use the adverbs encore and toujours and how their meanings overlap. Encore and toujours can both mean "still," and share a common negative form: ne plus (no longer).

In this video, you will learn the various meanings of encore, which Patricia will illustrate with several examples.

Patricia lists a few more usages of encore (still, again) and gives an overview of toujours (still, always). To learn more about these words, check out our written lesson on them.

There are many expressions in French linked to the color red, several of which have direct equivalents in English. Discover a few of them with Patricia.

Red alert! There are even more French expressions using the word rouge. Patricia explains several of them in this video.