‘Ever’ and ‘Never’ distinction may cause problems for students so it is worth spending extra time drilling, exercises and mingling activities to aid assimilation. If you are speaking about a specific time you cannot use this tense. It connects the past and the present, and we use since, so far, just, already, yet etc. The Present Perfect started in the past, but IT IS STILL TRUE TODAY or MIGHT HAPPEN AGAIN. If a time expression is used then it’s Past Simple. yesterday, last Saturday, last week, three months ago, with specific dates – in 1990. The Simple Past is used for action that happened in the past and is OVER/DONE/FINISHED – stress this point. Present Perfect – Experiences, Changes over time (accomplishments of humanity and uncompleted actions you are expecting could also be introduced later in the study course). Simple Past – Completed actions, a series of completed actions, duration in the past, habits in the past (past facts or generalizations could be left to a later lesson). I lived in London for 5 years (I don’t live there now). The Simple Past is used with ‘for’ when the actions have already finished: i.e. I have lived in London for 5 years (I still live there). The Present Perfect is used with ‘for’ and ‘since’, when the actions have not finished yet: i.e. I saw that movie on Thursday (we know exactly when). The Simple Past is used when the time is clear: i.e. I have seen that movie already (we don’t know when). The Present Perfect is used when the time is not specific: i.e. The Simple Past is used when giving older information: i.e. The Present Perfect is often used when giving recent news: i.e. I saw 3 movies last week (last week is finished). The Simple Past is used when the time period HAS finished - i.e. I have seen 3 movies this week (this week has not finished yet). The Present Perfect is used when the time period has NOT finished - i.e. For – can be used with all tenses (period of time).Įxplain Further Differences Between The Tensesĭon’t get bogged down in grammar. ‘ Have you had lunch?’ rather than ‘ Did you have lunch?’ Since – usually used with the Perfect Tenses only (point in past time). buy a car.Ĭ) Continuing situation – a state (not an action).īritish speakers use this tense more frequently: i.e. Limit the teaching uses at the Lower Intermediate Level:Ī) experience – not when you did something, but if you did it.ī) change or new information – e.g. ![]() ![]() Tell students not to try and translate into their own language – try to think in the tense itself. ![]() This tense gives speakers of some languages a degree of difficulty, because the concept/idea does not exist in their L1 – it is expressed with a present tense. When we tell a story we usually use the simple past – for ‘ action’ and the past continuous to ‘ set the scene.’ We say or understand the time and/or place of the event. The event is in the past – it is completed/finished. The past form for irregular verbs needs to be learned by heart.Īn action/situation – an event in the past, which can be short or long: i.e. Verbs ending in a consonant + ‘y’, change to …ied e.g. Check spellings and practice for short verbs with only one syllable, as the consonant is doubled i.e stopped, planned. Keep doing this activity until the child can appropriately use the past tense to talk about the actions that are represented.The past form for all regular verbs ends in …….ed/ or …….d: e.g. Instead of “fall”, we’re going to say “fell”. Listen, that’s something that already happened, so we’re going to change it. Look, she is running! (Show second picture) Oh no! What happened?.Here’s how that might sound during the activity: Model the correct past tense use of the word the child just provided and tell him that since it’s something that already happened, you have to change the word. If not, you may want to go back and work on labeling actions before you work on the past tense of them. Then, show the child the second picture and say “what happened?” The child should be able to describe the action that was performed, even if he doesn’t know how to use the past tense yet. Show the child one of your before pictures and describe what happened. Once you have chosen present/past tense and you have collected your pictures, it’s time to teach past tense verbs using actions that have just happened (as opposed to something that happened a while ago).
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