Je mange, not je suis mangeant: the -ing traps

No je suis mangeant: French has no -ing tense

English builds its continuous tenses with -ing (I am eating, she was reading). French does not: the plain present or the imparfait does the job.

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1. 1Elle lit.
2. 2Il fait la cuisine.
3. 3Il court.
4. 4Elle parle au téléphone.

Elle lit (she is reading), il fait la cuisine (he is cooking), il court (he is running), elle parle au téléphone (she is on the phone): the plain present, never an -ant form.

To stress that something is in progress right now, use être en train de plus the infinitive:

• Je suis en train de manger. - I am in the middle of eating.
• Il était en train de lire. - He was busy reading.

English -ing after a preposition, or as a subject, is an infinitive in French:

The full list of verbs and prepositions with an infinitive is on French verbs with à, de or nothing.

The -ant adjective agrees

Many -ant words are also ordinary adjectives, and as adjectives they agree. As a verb (in a gérondif, or a participle doing an action), the -ant form never changes:

The test: a quality is an adjective and agrees; an action is a verb and does not. A few pairs are even spelled differently: the adjective fatigant (tiring) against the participle fatiguant (tiring someone out).

Mistakes English speakers make