Search results for 'tag:Tenses tag:Prepositions' matching tags 'Tenses' and 'Prepositions'

Re: Some Grammar Questions

Clive — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 22:13:23 GMT

Hi,

Sentence: You never know what is going to happen to you, do you?

Begin the sentence with: "One"

One never knows what is going to happen to him/her, does one?

[What is wrong with this sentence? Is the usage of "him/her" correct. I think it is.]

No, be consistent. One never knows what is going to happen to one, does one?

Prepositions:

I hope you will advise Ben over his legal rights.

Is it correct?Say 'about' or 'of' or 'on'.

Tenses:

1. Two months from now she will be taking her final examination. OK

2. Completing the assignment, the students left the school. [Is this called a gerund ?]
No. A gerund is like a noun,
eg Swimming is fun.
eg Completing the assignment was difficult.

Best wishes, Clive

Some Grammar Questions

Ritwik06 — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:40:08 GMT

Sentence: You never know what is going to happen to you, do you?

Begin the sentence with: "One"

One never knows what is going to happen to him/her, does one?

[What is wrong with this sentence? Is the usage of "him/her" correct. I think it is.]

Prepositions:

I hope you will advise Ben over his legal rights.

Is it correct?

Tenses:

1. Two months from now she will be taking her final examination.

2. Completing the assignment, the students left the school. [Is this called a gerund ?]

Are these correct?

Re: Structure of sentence

lisadove — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 12:21:33 GMT

16: is known as (passive structure; active form: We know Boston as the Hub...)

17. storing, erasing and retrieving (These are parallel and should be in the same form.)

18. Professor Andom Iyassou ("Professor" is a title. If Andom Iyassou is one person, "professor" must be singular.)

19. one mile high (height is a noun; high is an adjective)

20. a symbol (tree is singular and a is singular, so symbol should be singular)

21. as efficient as (the conventional structure for a comparison. "so efficient as" could be used as follows: The software is not so efficient as to make the previous version obsolete.)

22. I suspect you made a mistake in copying this item. I would guess (C) "for a great deal of their content on the majority of their pages."

23. very much alike. (alike is not a noun; only nouns can be preceded by the.)

24. in seconds (we use in with expressions of time: in a few days, in a million years, in about an hour.)

25. Boggs hit a grand slam (making is used in the first part because it's the object of the preposition after, so it must be in noun [gerund?] form. The main clause is "Wade Boggs hit [past tense] a grand slam for the Red Sox.")

I don't have time to do more; perhaps someone else will finish...

Re: What is the deference....?

YoungCalifornian — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:30:28 GMT

She went to Cambridge.

Went is the past tense of go. If you "go to" a school, it usually means you attend there as a student.

She has been to Cambridge.

Been is the past participle of be. The sentence literally means that at some point in the past she was at Cambridge, but not necessarilly that she was enrolled as a student. The usage of the past participle as opposed to the preterite also implies that there is a meaning or reason she was there that is relevant to the present.

She was in Cambridge.

Was is the past tense of be. It simply means that she was there is the past. Also, the use of the preposition "in" means that she was in the town of Cambridge. If you mean the univerisity, use the preposition "at" instead. Generally you don't say that you are "in" universities.

To sum up, the verb "to be" in reference to a university means that the subject is simply present at the university. To indicate that the subject is a present there as a student, one should use "to go to" or "to attend." The usage of the past participle (be=been, go=gone) in this context (i.e. perfect aspect) indicates a past action with direct relevance to the present.

Looking for some tips and/or curriculum suggestions

mikesusangray — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 21:50:11 GMT

Hi all!

I've been giving English conversation lessons to a theology professor for about a year now. He's getting on in the years - a couple years from retirement - and his primary goal has been just to get his spoken English going a little stronger. His mother tongue is French but he's been teaching at a German language university for many years.

I'd like to add some more specific inputs to our lessons but I can't seem to find the right material. His passive skills are excellent - he reads widely and with perfect comprehension in his field - and he can communicate quite understandably. He is a linguistics specialist and can grasp any concept about the language immediately. I brought along Cambridge Advanced Grammar in Use and he could plow through a chapter in five minutes with perfect conceptual comprehension.

However, he also continues to make very simple errors - for example, he has trouble choosing between present simple and continuous or often uses the present tense for past events. Sentence order tends to get wander hither and yon while definite and indefinite articles come and go with the tide. (Prepositions are a problem too, but I won't beat him to hard there - prepositions are difficult in any new language.) In many cases his mistakes are typical of French or German speech patterns.

One other limitation is that he enjoys the weekly lessons (a good hour), but doesn't have much time to study in between.

Right now we spend about 15 minutes reading a chapter from Advanced Grammar in Use and about 45 minutes talking about just about anything under the sun, while I take notes and show him problems under the categories Pronunciation/Articles & Prespositions/Word Order/Other Grammar/Vocabulary/Idioms. However, I don't think the work book is a good choice - particularly since he doesn't do the homework - and it seems like he isn't making very good progress with his typical problem patterns - though he greets them like old friends when I point them out.

Any tips here?

Re: Passive or Past Tense? "+ing"?

CalifJim — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 02:10:29 GMT

happyhour123
How come in these sentences all the verbs is have "ing"?

The -ing form is the only form of the verb that is allowed after a preposition.

for (not) having

for tampering

while leaving

for giving

without seeing; by going; since finding; before paying, etc.

____

And in another case the -ing form remains after the deletion of "who was": ... the officer (who was) inspecting his car.

Please help me proofread...

samwalker — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 17:35:03 GMT

British Columbia is a Canadian province with beautiful cities. Such as Vancouver and Victoria. In Vancouver, visitors can walk around Stanley Park, go to several wonderful museums, or shop in big malls. On a sunny day, the views around Vancouver are beautiful. Because you can see the mountains. Many tourists come to visit British Columbia from all over the world. If you ever have the chance to go to Western Canada. You should try to visit British Columbia. At first, life was difficult for me in the U.S., I didn't understand English. I could speak only a few words of English, so it was very hard to communicate. Luckily, I had some friends who spoke English they could help me a lot. When I needed to fill out applications or go to the doctor, my friends translated for me. Now I can do everything by myself because I speak and understand English quite well, and I am getting along fine. The new city library near my house built in 1990. Every day I am going to the library to study in a quiet place. Yesterday, I studied in the library for 3 hours. Residents are allow to check out books, CDs, and tapes from the library. I had my own library card since last August. Students usually have homeworks every day.I always have to read book and write summary. I sometimes learn useful information in my reading assignments. This week we are reading stories from several country. I'm learning about tradition and customs in Chile. Both the tapes and the book for our listening class is available in the college bookstore. One of my favorite hobbies are looking at books in a big bookstore. The people who work in the bookstore are very helpful. Every student need to know how to get to the bookstore. The bookstore opens at 8:00am and closes at 8:00pm on weekdays.

My corrections:
-cities such as? (delete the period?)
-beautiful because (delete the period?)
-Canada, you (comma, not a period?)
-U.S. - I didn't...?
-English so (delete the comma?)
-who spoke English they could help me a lot (and they could?)
-needed (need?)
-translated (translate?)
-well and (delete comma?)
-was built?
-go?
-should it be spelled out - three?
-allowed?
-have had... since last...? or Had..last August?
-books? summaries?
-Is 'sometimes' on the right position in the sentence?
-week we (week, we?)
-are?
-one of... is/are?
-needs

Is there any other wrong tense usage? Any wrong punctuation, punctuations which should be changed/deleted, pluralization, preposition, grammatical errors I missed to correct?

Re: could be taken care

Philip — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 15:50:59 GMT

It's fine, except for the preposition of. However, to keep the tenses 'in order', it would be better to say: "I would like to be a sheep. I could be taken care of by a shepherd."

Re: tense problems

Cool Breeze — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 16:42:18 GMT

In the first sentence the use of a present tense (think) emphasises what your opinion is now. The past tense (thought) refers to the past; your opinion may have changed by now.

"I told her that I am (was?) happy in my job" Both are right. The sequence of tenses would require was but if you are still happy, the present tense is also possible.

"I said to her that I do (did?) not know where Bob had gone to" I would use did in your sentence because of the that clause. If you had a quotation within quotation marks, even do would be correct in some contexts. The last preposition should be omitted.

Re: Please, help me with my questions

Grammar Geek — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 13:17:55 GMT

Hi Thammy,

1) Please, is the underlined order below, correct?

"It's a beautiful, big and great museum"

These three make an awkward combination. I think "great" is probably the problem. It's a big, beautiful museum. It's a terrific, big, beautiful museum. (Don't say "great big" because that sounds like it's very big insetadn of both big and great.)

2) - Is it also correct to write/say "coastal cities" for those that are spotted near the coast ?
You can certainly say "coastal cities" but I don't think you want to say "spotted." Do you mean "located" or "sited"?

3) What is the correct verb tense for this sentence:

" I have stayed for four weeks in 2007 and made new friends there."

(or)

"I stayed for four weeks in 2007 and made new friends there."

Generally when you refer to a specific time in the past ("in 2007") you use simple past.

3b. (In both sentences I believe it's better to omit the preposition "for" to avoid 'cacophony', isn't it?)

The first "for" may be glided over. I stayed fuhfour. I wouldn't omit it outright.