More general question about little words between two infinitives

Question

My question is about a quiz question in this unit: "J'ai décidé d'apprendre à jouer du piano cette année." How do you know it's "apprendre *à* jouer" instead of "apprendre *de* jouer," for example. I think that French verbs differ in this respect, but I haven't seen any systematic explanation of it, and I don't even know how to talk about it in a way that could make internet search productive. Do you have any teaching materials about this, or can you help me to understand it better? Thanks in advance.

Cécile Janty-Davies · Accepted Answer

Hi Max,
We now have some lists of verbs which take à or de before an infinitive. 
https://french.kwiziq.com/learn/theme/1048233
https://french.kwiziq.com/learn/theme/3975140
https://french.kwiziq.com/learn/theme/3812349
There will be more so, look out for them...

Chris Wirt · Answer

There's no rule, rhyme or reason to this, I know. Some words take à, some take de and some can take either. You simply have to memorize this along with the word.

Apprendre à faire qqc. -- To learn to do something.
Décider de faire qqc. -- To decide to do something.