How can you tell if a word is masculine?

Answer 1

You can tell the gender of the nouns by watching at the article in front of it:

'la' or 'une' indicates a feminine noun.
'le' or 'un' indicates a masculine noun.

une voiture, la lune: feminine (a car, the moon)
le soleil, un camion : masculine (the sun, a truck)

Adjectives have no fixed gender, but may vary according to the noun. Thus a feminine noun will often have a following adjective with the 'e' at the end. This can be used as a clue:

... grande maison (a big house) > (maison is feminine)
... petite fille (a small girl)

but ... grand garage (no 'e' at the end of the adjective)
... petit garçon (little boy)

Answer 2

In languages with grammatical gender, such as Spanish or French, the masculine words usually end in specific letters, have specific endings, or follow specific patterns. You can often tell if a word is masculine by looking at its ending or by referring to a dictionary that indicates the gender of nouns.