Search results for 'tag:Auxiliaries tag:Simple past' matching tags 'Auxiliaries' and 'Simple past'

Re: Names of different tenses

Cool Breeze — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 17:58:41 GMT

Raen
He would have had completed the task if he had asked for help before he left work -- would have had completed used for had asked (past perfect) that happens before left (simple past)

Is it false then? "would have + (past perfect)" doesn't exist?

These terms may not be the same everywhere but the basic grammar of the language is the same all over the Anglo-Saxon world! Would have had completed is always wrong. Would is a defective/modal auxiliary and only an infinitive is possible after these auxiliaries. In this case the perfect infinitive must be used. There are two theoretical alternatives using your verbs. Either would have completed or would have had. All other combinations are wrong. The perfect infinitive consists of have + past participle. It is impossible to have another past participle right after a perfect infinitive. That is impossible in all Germanic languages, I believe.

Re: Simple Past Lesson Plan

Mister Micawber — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 13:18:55 GMT

.
Overall, it should work fine, MZL. A few corrections and fewer comments:

Objective: To be able to use the Past Simple question forms and short answers.

Target Language: did + subject + base (or 'dictionary') form of verb ( Did your mother call you? ) -- It is best to save the term 'infinitive' for that function.

Question word + did + subject + base form of verb ( What did you do last night? )

Anticipated Problems: Students may use statements without using the auxiliary verb.

E.g. You went out yesterday? -- This is a common question form in current English. It cannot be considered incorrect.

Solutions:

During the presentation stage, draw students' attention to the fact that 'Did' does not change its form. 'Did' is always used to form the question in the Past Simple.
Point out the verb tense in the question form. Did + subject + base form of the verb

Preparation and Aids: Simple reading text ,dialogue, in the Simple Past using vocabulary that

students are already familiar with. Handout for homework correcting sentences

Lesson Plan

Stage	Activity	Interaction	Timing
1	Warm up : Timed Scatergories with pre-picked themes (food, things you do on the weekend...) Review homework from last class	TS ST
2	Introduction : Using a picture of two young women, elicit from students their names. Write them on the board. Hand out the dialogue between these two friends who are talking about their past weekend. (A dialogue that mostly contains vocabulary the students are familiar with) -- *This picture is a useless prop. Visual prompts, if used, should be rich in potential material.* *Have 2 students stand up for a moment to set the scene; then they can sit down.*	TS ST
3	Have students read the dialogue and answer specific gist questions on it to check their understanding.-- *There is no such thing as a 'specific gist' question. The two terms are antonymic. Questions are either for gist (a general impression) or for specific response.*	S ST
4	Ask students to focus on the language used by asking what question Â« A Â» asked Â« B Â». Write this question on the board.	TS ST
5	Presentation : Show students how it is formed Did + Subject + base Did you have a good weekend ? Point out that we don't use the past form of the verb in questions, but always the base (or dictionary) form.	TS
6	Drill chorally and individually. Focus on pronunciation and correct structure.	TST
7	Elicit : Draw students attention to the short answer and explain the positive and the negative structures. Yes + Subject + did Yes I did No + Subject + didn't No I didn't	TS
8	Drill chorally and individually and then conduct a controlled question-and-answer drill around the class : E.g : Â« Sandrine ask Didier...(point to an action the board : - go to the restaurant - go to the movies ) Â»	ST SS
9	Pairwork : Students ask and answer questions from the board and note down their partners' answers. The focus here is on correct pronunciation and structure, so it is important to correct any errors by referring to the structures on the board.	PW
10	Controlled Oral Practice : Use Dialogue text as a basis to talk about what the two characters did on the weekend. Also use visual support such as a picture of a restaurant to prompt questions. For example, show a picture of two friends having a conversation; encourage them to produce the following question : Â« Did they go to a restaurant ? Yes, they did / No, they didn't. Â» Give four picture examples as prompts.	TS SS TS
11	Monitor closely. Correct errors by using what's already on the board as a point of reference.	TS SS
12	If students are performing well, turn focus to what they did on the weekend. They ask each other questions and give short answers.	PW
13	Follow up with controlled written practice. I could use questions and answers where the words are all mixed up ; students put the words back in the correct order.	S
14	Homework : a transformation exercise (changing affirmative statements into questions and short answers)	S

Simple Past Lesson Plan

mzl14000 — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 11:40:33 GMT

Would anybody be kind enough to tell me what they think of this lesson plan I've made for my TEFL module ? Any suggestions ??
Thanks so much .

MZL

Lesson Plan
Preparation

Level : Elementary

Lesson Length: 45 minutes

Objective: To be able to use the Past simple question forms and shot answers.

Target Language: did + subject + infinitive form of verb ( Did your mother call you? )

Question word + subect + did + subject + infinitive form of verb

( What did you do last night? )

Short answers:

Yes + subject + did ( Did it rain? Yes, it did.)

No + subject + didn't ( Did Helen come to the party? )

Assumed Knowledge: Past simple ( regular / irregular verbs ,negative form )

Anticipated Problems: Students may use statements without using the auxiliary verb.

E.g. You went out yesterday? Instead of, ( Did you go out yesterday? )

Students may use a past form of the verb to make the question instead

of using the Simple form. E.g. Did you went?

Solutions:

During the presentation stage, draw students' attention to the fact that 'Did' does not change its form. 'Did' is always used to form the question in the Past simple.
Point out the verb tense in the quuestion form. Did + subject + infinitive of the verb
Drill individually and chorally.
Practice making questions. Monitoring for errors and having them put scrambled sentences

in order can also help to work on sentence structure problems.

Preperation and Aids: Simple reading text ,dialogue, in the Simple Past using vocabulary that

students are already familiar with. Handout for homework correcting sentences

Lesson Plan

Stage	Activity	Interaction	Timing
1	Warmer : Timed Scatergories with pre-picked themes (food, things you do on the weekend...) Review homework from last class	TS ST
2	Introduction : Using a picture of two young women, elicit from students their names. Write them on the board. Hand out the dialogue between these two friends who are talking about their past weekend. (A dialogue that mostly contains vocabulary the students are familiar with)	TS ST
3	Have students read the dialogue and answer specific gist questions on it to check their understanding.	S ST
4	Ask students to focus on the language used by asking what question Â« A Â» asked Â« B Â». Write this question on the board.	TS ST
5	Presentation : Show students how it is formed Did + Subject + Infinitive Did you have a good weekend ? Point out that we don't use the past form of the verb in questions, but always the infinitive.	TS
6	Drill chorally and individually. Focus on pronunciation and correct structure.	TST
7	Elicit : Draw students attention to the short answer and explain the positive and the negative structures. Yes + Subject + did Yes I did No + Subject + didn't No I didn't	TS
8	Drill chorally and individually and then conduct a controlled question and answer drill around the class : E.g : Â« Sandrine ask Didier...(point to an action the board : - go to the resaurant - go to the movies ) Â»	ST SS
9	Pairwork : Students ask and answer questions from the board and note down their partners answers. The focus here is on correct pronunciation and structure so it is important to correct any errors by refering to the structures on the board.	PW
10	Controlled Oral Practice : Use Dialogue text as a basis to talk about what the two characters did on the weekend. Also use visual support such as a picture of a restaurant to prompt questions. For example show a picture of two friends having a conversation ; encourage them to produce the following question : Â« Did they go to a restaurant ? Yes, they did / No, they didn't. Â» Give four picture expamples as prompts.	TS SS TS
11	Monitor closely. Correct errors by using what's already on the board as a point of reference.	TS SS
12	If students are performing well, turn focus to what they did on the weekend. They ask each other questions ans give short answers.	PW
13	Follow up with controlled written practice. I could use questions and answers where the words are all mixed up ; students put the words back in the correct order.	S
14	Homework : a transformation exercise (changing affermative statements into questions and short answers)	S

Re: Need help over here.

Mr Wordy — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 02:08:00 GMT

1. Well, "had" is the past tense of the verb "have", but I think you're asking specifically about its use as an auxiliary to form the past perfect tense of other verbs:

I played -- simple past tense

I have played -- present perfect tense

I had played -- past perfect (or pluperfect) tense

So, even though "have" on its own is present tense, it forms a past tense with other verbs. If you do a Google search for these tense names then you will find tons of information on their uses. See, for example, http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/pastperfect.html (this page describes the past perfect; all the other tenses are linked down the left hand side).

"I have played football yesterday" isn't right. "have played football" has the general sense of "played football on one or more unspecified occasions in the past", and it doesn't go with "yesterday", which is a specific occasion. Instead you would say "I played football yesterday".

2. "Never" can be used with a variety of different tenses, depending on when the thing in question wasn't/isn't done or didn't/doesn't happen. A couple of examples:

You never told me that you loved me -- means that you didn't tell me in the past, but you might tell me now (or in the future).

You never tell me that you love me -- means that you didn't tell me in the past and you don't tell me now. In other words, the absence of telling continues up to and including the present.

It's not possible to use the present tense with "never before", so "I never do that before" is wrong. It should be "I never did that before" (or "I have never done that before").

Re: Can anyone help me to explain why this sentence is incorrect?

Clive — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 16:25:21 GMT

Hi,

I would appreciate any help to explain in grammatical terms why the following sentence doesn't work:

* I didn't talked to Simon on Sunday.

Is it because a past simple verb cannot follow another past tense? It is obviously incorrect, but I'm not sure how to explain this to my German friend.

I'm not a qualified teacher, but I live in Germany at the moment and have been trying to help some of my friends with their English. They usually ask

for grammatical explanations

Your example breaks the rules for how tenses are formed.

How to form Simple Past tense

I talked Here, the suffix '-ed' denotes the past

I did not talk. Here, the auxiliary verb 'did' denotes the past, and the main verb must be in base form only.

Best wishes, Clive

Re: It was thought (by many) to have been written by Michael.

Jackson6612 — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 16:17:01 GMT

It was thought (by many) to have been written by Michael.

In the above sentence:

''It'' is used as a subject.

''was'' is an auxiliary verb showing simple past tense and ''thought'' is a past participle serving the function of the main verb with reference to some past action.

''to have been'', as CB says, is a perfect infinitive and ''written'' is a past participle.

Is what I say above correct?

You should be going now.

In the above sentence:

''should'' is a modal verb.

''be'' is an auxiliary verb and ''going'' a main verb.

Is my description correct?

Re: have come vs have came?

Philip — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 16:12:52 GMT

Loojka wrote:
It's should have + past participle

1) You should have come to the party. - OK

2) You should have came to the party. - not OK

1) You should have went to the party. - wrong ("gone" instead of "went")
2) You should have shot the target. - OK (but the past simple and the past participle of this verb are the same)

'Came' is the simple past tense and should never be used with the auxiliary 'have'. 'Come', even though it looks like the present, is the past participle to be used in the compound tenses.

Re: WHICH ONE IS CORRECT

Efecevher — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 21:48:44 GMT

Anonymous wrote:

WHICH SENTENCE IS CORRECT

DID YOU FLY IN?

OR

DID YOU FLEW IN?

When you use an auxiliary verb in the simple past tense, that is in negatives and questions, you better use bare infinitive.

Re: Not sure about this...

Clive — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 05:11:11 GMT

Hi,

Could you help me to distinguish (what is the difference between these...?) these two confused sentences? Before you do, please explain clearly. Thank you.

1. I did play.

2. I played.

Both are OK, although you would usually say #2 instead of #1.

Various tenses involve both main and auxiliary verbs. This is the Simple Past tense, and its auxiliary is 'did'. For a simple and positive statement, the auxiliary is not normally used, but we see it in negatives and in questions. eg

I played.

I did not play.

Did you play?

Didn't you play?

You played, didn't you?

You played, did you?

When you say 'I did play' instead of 'I played', it is often because you want to add emphasis.

Mary: You didn't play.

Tom: You are wrong. I did play, I did, I did, I did.

Best wishes, Clive

Modal + Perfect Infinitive = Meaning?

Brummel — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 14:37:20 GMT

Hello

I have trouble explaining modal auxiliaries to German speakers.

He must be drunk.

to put this into the past = He must have been drunk.

She should see the doctor.

this into the past = she should have seen the doctor.

But ....

He can play the piano

into the past =? #1. he can have played the piano.... or ......
#2. he could have played the piano..... or.......
#3. he could play the piano

#1 sounds strange to my English ears.
#2 is subjunctive isn't it?
#3 seems right but goes against trend with 'must' and 'should'

The word 'could' is both the simple past of can AND the subjunctive form of can, but I'm
not complaining. It is the only one of 'must', 'should' and 'can' which has a past form.
Perhaps therein lies the problem.

What are the detailed, (Oxford-)proper meanings of #1, #2 and #3?