A journey from hell... - a passive voice story

Recently, we have been practising the passive. 

It is a difficult construction and it takes a lot of practice before you are able to use it comfortably. 

So in order to help you out, I've prepared a story (in the active voice), that could be changed to the passive. You have the example of how this could be done in red. 

Please note, that sentences in green CANNOT be changed to the passive.

Early morning, I set off to work as usual. The journey from Hartlepool to Middlesbrough usually takes me about 35 minutes. This morning, it took me 2 hours. From the very beginning everything was wrong.

 I didn't lock the car and somebody broke into it. The car wasn't locked and it was broken into.

 Somebody stole my CD player.

 Somebody broke my rear window.

 Somebody left their coat in my car.

 I called the police.

 The police investigated the scene.

 The police took the finger prints.

 *They advised me to call my insurance company. I was advised... 

The insurance company delivered a replacement car in 30 minutes.

They gave me the keys to the replacement car and I went to work.

When I arrived at work, Alison told me that being late is unacceptable.

Alison gave me a warning.

I was so angry that I said I wanted a day off!

Below, you have some flashcards that will help you check if your answers are correct. 

Flash Card Deck created by mariolahejduk with GoConqr

Basic tenses in English

The question that I am very often asked by my students is, 'How many tenses are there in English?' They usually ask this question because they've heard that there are so many of them and it simply scares them that there is so much grammar to learn before they can be confident speakers.

In this post, I'm going to tackle the issue and hopefully make learning tenses less scary. But let's start with the basics. Have a look at the picture below: 

This is a visual representation of what we can do in every language in the world: express present, past and future. This is called a language property and it gives us a unique opportunity not only to talk about what's happening now, but also recall past events and even talk about things that haven't happened yet (animals can communicate too, but they are not able to 'talk' about anything other than now). 

In order to be able to express past, present and future, we need tenses. Tense is a grammatical time. By now, at Entry 3, you would have heard names like Present Simple, Past Continuous, Future Simple, etc. They all are tenses and they all describe different 'times' in grammar. 

So, how many tenses are there? Grammarians still argue about this because they can't reach a consensus of what a tense exactly is, but if you really need to know the number, it's (lucky :))13. 

It seems a lot, but don't worry, there is a logic in them and they tend to repeat themselves in different 'times', e.g. there is Present Continuous and Past Continuous; Present Simple and Past Simple; Present Perfect and Past Perfect. And if you know one in the pair of tenses, you'll learn the other one quickly because they are very similar. For example, 'I am writing' is Present Continuous; 'I was writing' is Past Continuous. The only difference is 'am' and 'was'- so the verb 'to be'. The -ing form stays the same in both tenses. So if you know that for Present Continuous you need 'to be' + verb + -ing', the formula is the same for Past Continuous too, but the verb 'to be' has to be in the past. 

What's more, some of the tenses are rather rare so you might not even come across them very often in every day speech. An example of such tense is Past Perfect, a tense that expresses very distant or more distant past. For example, you can say: 'I had spoken to my friend before I spoke with my mother'. In this sentence, the first part is in more distant past hence Past Perfect (had spoken). The second part  (spoke) in 'closer' past hence Past Simple. But speakers of English like to simplify things, so instead of using Past Perfect, they just say: 'First, I spoke to my friend, then I spoke with my mother', using Past Simple in both parts of the sentence instead.

OK, so if you don't need all the tenses to be a good user of English, how many do you actually need? Below is a mind map that shows the basic tenses in English. There are only 8 tenses. At your level, you should have seen them all by now: 

Mind Map created by mariolahejduk with GoConqr

So there they are- the most important tenses in English and the 'time' they express. Don't worry if you don't know them yet or if you don't quite know when to use them. But that's a topic for another post...

Present Perfect Continuous- We have been talking about it...

Hello students!

Recently, we have been talking about present perfect continuous tense. This tense is very similar to present perfect, the only difference being the continuous aspect, i.e. -ing. I've used this tense in the first sentence of this post- 'We have been talking about present perfect.'

Here are some more examples of sentences. Some of them are positive (+), some are negative (-) and some are questions (?).

(+) I have been living in the UK for 10 years.

(+) We have been redecorating our room for the past hour.

(+) They have been waiting for Michelle since 5 o’clock.

(+) Jim has been watching TV all morning.

(?) How long have you been living in your current house? 

(-) Jack and Jill have not been making progress in their English class recently. 

So in order to create this tense we need:

Have/has + been + verb + ing 

So when should we use this tense? Look at the infographic below:

Now, let's practise  the form. Blow you have a set of 11 flashcards. Each flashcard contains words that you need to use to create a sentence in present perfect continuous. Read the words, and say, or write the sentence. Later, click on the card to reveal the answer.

Present Perfect Continuous | Create infographics

Flash Card Deck created by mariolahejduk with GoConqr

Finally, there is another exercise to practise the form. Read the description and select the correct sentence:

  Quiz created by mariolahejduk with GoConqr

For more information and exercises about this tense please, go to:

present perfect and present perfect continuous
BBC Grammar challenge
More explanation and more practice

What are past participles?

In every language people are able to express present (now), past and future. They do this using verbs. Verbs are words like 'go', 'do', 'feel', etc. that describe an action or a state. Look at the following sentences:

* I study English.

* I studied English.

Those two sentences are very similar but one of them is in present (the first one), and the other one is in the past. How do you know that? By the form of the verb.

study- is the present form of a verb
studied- is the past form of a verb

So verbs describe grammatical 'time'. We call this grammatical 'time' a tense. By now, you should know the present simple tense, or the past continuous tense or maybe the future tense. In every one of those tenses the verb looks a little bit different (e.g. present simple- study/studies, present continuous- is/are studying, future tense- will study).

So what is the past participle?

It is a form of a verb that you need to create the present perfect tense. Sometimes it is called V3 (verb 3 because it's the third form of a verb in a list of irregular verbs that you have to memorise).

Do you recognise this?

Yes, the list that you have to learn by heart! Past participle is the last form of the verb on that list.

Be careful though because the list is only for irregular verbs. If the verb is regular, e.g. love, talk, study, listen, etc., we create past participles by adding -ed, just like in the case of the past simple tense. So the verbs above will have the following past pariciples: loved, talked, studied, listened.

So to help you practise your past participles, I've prepared some flashcards. Look at the word and say its past participle to yourself, then click on it and the card will turn showing the correct form. If you get it right, click 'thumbs up' and the word will not repeat. If you get it wrong, click 'thumbs down' and the word will apprear again for you to try. There are 62 words in total!


Flash Card Deck created by mariolahejduk with GoConqr

Just in case you wanted to see more irregular verbs in groups (and there are about 200 of them in normal use!) please  go here.

Definite & indefinite articles in English- not as easy as they seem!

'a'/'an'/'the'- simple and innocent looking words that every student of English recognises. They are so easy to spell and you can see them in every English text. Don't be fooled, my dear students, they are one of the most ruthless creatures of English grammar because they don't want to be learned!

Why are they difficult?

1. There are a lot of rules about articles, and knowing rules is not enough, you also need to be able to apply them correctly (the most difficult part).

2. The rules are confusing and difficult to remember. For example, we use 'the' with the names of hotels and museums, e.g. the Regent Hotel, the Science Museum, but we don't use 'the' with the names of airports, stations and other important buildings, e.g. Cambridge University, London Zoo. (eh?!)

3. Sometimes the rules are broken altogether because people omit articles in set phrases where they would normally occur, e.g. We say: 'go to school', 'be at school', 'start school', etc. and not 'go to the school', and so on.

4. For some nationalities, the concept of articles as something that defines a noun is completely alien (any Polish people out there?). This means that some languages do not have a similar grammatical concept and therefore learners often don't understand its function in a language. For example, for a Polish speaking person there is no difference in meaning between 'I saw a man' and 'I saw the man' (The difference is: I saw a man- any man; I saw the man- a particular person that you and I know). What's more, many Polish speakers will frequently make a mistake like 'I saw man'. Man is man, right? I don't need 'a' or 'the' to understand it. ;)

How can I learn articles?

First, it's important not to stress out about the correct use of articles. Of course, they are important and if you want to be a proficient speaker of English, you need to know how to use them correctly, but the bottom line is that nouns carry the main meaning, not the articles. For example, when you speak to an English person and you say 'I saw man', they will understand what you're saying, but if you say 'I saw a...', they won't know what you're talking about. Remember, nouns carry the meaning.

So, how can you learn articles? Practise, practise, practise.

Generally, as far as articles go, it's better just to pick them up from English speakers rather than trying to memorise all the rules. However, knowing rules is sometimes beneficial because it is something you can fall back on when you are in doubt whether to use or not to use articles.

Below, I prepared a very long (but not complete!) presentation that explains rules of using definite and indefinite articles. I advise that you watch it when you are in good mood ;)

My video is too long and is on YouTube!

Finally, have a go at some exercises to practise the use of articles.

A, an, the with answers

Quiz- select the correct answer

Plenty of exercises- follow the links

Select the correct answer

The troublesome comma!

At Entry 3/Level 1 you should have a pretty clear idea about punctuation.

We need punctuation in writing to signal where the sentence ends and the other one starts (by using a full stop). We need it to mark a question (by using a question mark) and break down very long sentences (by using comma). We can also express our strong emotions (by using an exclamation mark), like in: I love this blog!

But then there is the troublesome comma! Comma is by far the most confusing of all punctuation marks. Mainly because it is not used consistently, i.e. people forget to put comma in their sentences or put it in the wrong place. Sometimes it is due to the fact that the use of comma depends on whether you are using American or British English. At other times, different punctuation books will have slightly different rules about the use of comma. And if you decide to use the Internet to find out about its correct use, different websites will give you conflicting information.  It's a mess!

So I decided to tackle the issue once and for all. I was getting confused too!

I checked my Oxford Advanced Learner's dictionary as well as the Oxford dictionary website. I found a lot of useful information and I created this mind map that summarises what I've learned:

  Mind Map created by mariolahejduk with ExamTime

As you can see there are two examples in red.

The first one concerns the use of comma in direct speech. As you know, direct speech is when you quote the exact words that people said (as opposed to reporting what they said). For example, 'I spend  my holidays abroad', said Gemma. The words between quotation marks (' ') are direct speech. We need to separate them from the rest of the sentence by a comma. Another example could be: John said, 'I don't like driving'. Again, the words between quotation marks are separated from the rest of the sentence by a comma. However, when we quote a question or an exclamation, we do not separate the direct speech from the rest of the sentence by a comma. For example: 'What time is it?' asked Mary; 'What a splendid surprise!' exclaimed Sue.

The second example in red concerns the use of comma in compound sentences joined by words like 'and', 'but', 'so', 'or', 'yet', 'as'. WARNING: the fact that you can put a comma before 'and' and 'but', etc. does not mean that you always need to do it. Look at the following examples:

• I walked along and turned into the first street. (No comma)
• I saw my friend Andy but I didn't stop to speak to him. (No comma)
• I can't stay here long as I have an appointment in half an hour. (No comma)

Generally, we don't need a comma before those conjunctions when the sentences are short(er). 

We do need a comma before 'and', 'but', 'so', 'or', 'yet', 'as' when the sentences are long. Look at the following example:

• I spoke to my landlady who said that she cannot do anything about the broken boiler, and that she wasn't going to pay for the repair, but she offered that I can pay my rent one week later, which was nice of her, I guess. 

Here the sentence is much longer and we need commas to break it down into manageable pieces. 

Finally, it is also a general rule that you need to break down long sentences (so called complex sentences or compound-complex sentences), even if they don't always contain the conjunctions above. Look at the example:

• If you decide to buy the house, call me and I'll give you some advice. 
• When you get there, please go to the main reception desk and ask for John Smith. 
• If you keep calm, take your time, concentrate and think ahead, then you're likely to pass your test. 

Speaking of tests, how about taking all information that you've learned from this post and put it to test? Below, you have 10 sentences without any punctuation marks. Read the sentences and choose the correct answer (A, B or C)- use my mind map to help you!

Quiz created by mariolahejduk with ExamTime

Future tenses part 2

Hello Students!

In January last year, I posted an entry about future tenses in English. It contained a useful mind map and some links to exercises. The post is here if you want to refresh your knowledge of the forms and the uses of different future tenses in English. (I strongly recommend that! :))



Today, I am posting some more practice exercises for future tenses in English. Have a go at the following quiz. It contains 13 sentences using 4 different future tenses: 'will' (future simple tense), 'to be going to', present simple and present continuous. Decide whether the sentences use the correct future tense (you need to click true if the tense is used correctly; and false if the tense is used incorrectly). When you have finished with the quiz, click on submit answers. Later, click on review answers to see the explanation of use.
  Quiz created by mariolahejduk with ExamTime