Julia
Did you/have you been. Please, help me to understand the rules by we use one or another past tense. Hi, guys! Please, help me to understand the rules by we use one or another past tense. For example: I missed two days of classes and an impotant football match for the schooi team. 1) Before that, I HAD NOT MISSED (why not "had not been missing"?) a day of school for two years. Anyway, I passed my driving test! 2) I HAD BEEN TAKING ( why not "had took"?) lessons for six months, so I`m glad I finaly have my licence. I was happy to hear you`re going to Paris this summer. 3) HAVE YOU BOOKED (why not "Did you book"?) the tiket yet? Oh, friends, help me to understand this damn rule!
Jan 27, 2015 7:34 AM
Answers · 9
3
These are good questions and not so easy to answer, but I'll try :) 1) Before that, I HAD NOT MISSED (why not "had not been missing"?) a day of school for two years. In this sentence you are talking about a definite amount. 'A day' = one day, so we usually use a perfect simple tense when it is a definite quantity. I had missed five days. [definite quantity] a) I had missed a lot of days [up to that point]. b) I had been missing a lot of days [before then]. They could mean the same but there might be a subtle difference. a) only tells us what happened up to the point and, in effect, the period you're describing finishes there. We would probably use this form if we were going to say something was a result of this: I had missed a lot of days, so I failed the test. [a direct result or consequence] b) tells us what happened up to that point but, because it is continuous, it gives us the opportunity to say that this changed (or stayed the same) after the point: I had been missing a lot of days until then, but then I got better and didn't miss any more days. [an indirect result - getting better wasn't caused by missing days] 2) I HAD BEEN TAKING (why not "had took"?) lessons for six months, so I`m glad I finaly have my licence. With 'action' verbs (as opposed to state verbs), we usually use perfect continuous when talking about time (rather than quantity). I had been taking lessons for six months. ['I had taken lessons for six months,' is also correct but it doesn't give us the same sense of time passing as the first sentence.] I had taken 50 lessons. [We wouldn't say, 'I had been taking 50 lessons,' as there is a definite quantity.]
January 27, 2015
3
3) HAVE YOU BOOKED (why not "Did you book"?) the tiket yet? We would use present perfect here to show that if the answer is no, we expect it to change. 'Did you book your ticket,' would suggest that if the answer is no, we would be surprised or it might even be too late to book it now. Generally, we use present perfect to talk about past actions/events that can change in the future (or are expected to change) and past simple to talk about things that can't (or we don't expect) to change in the future. [This is to do with the time period continuing or having ended.] a) Have you seen the new Spielberg film yet? If the answer to this is no, we strongly expect that the person will see it at some point (maybe they are a big Spielberg fan). b) Did you see the new Spielberg film? This suggests that if the answer is no, you don't necessarily expect them to see it in the future. But these are implications and the context will always be important in such sentences. Perhaps a better example would be: Have you ever been to that restaurant? If no, it is still possible to go in the future. Did you ever go to that restaurant? If the answer is no, it will always be no [in typical usage]. The restaurant has closed down or you live in a different city now, or something like this. A good tip for understanding the differences between perfect simple and perfect continuous is to study the differences between present simple and present continuous. There are something like seven or eight differences (or more or less depending on how you define them) and most of these difference will be very similar in the perfect tenses.
January 27, 2015
2
I missed two days of classes and an important football match for the school team. 1) Before that, I HAD NOT MISSED (why not "had not been missing"?) a day of school for two years. It is past perfect tense, which means that something had happened AND FINISHED BEFORE an action IN THE PAST. She the key is "HAD FINISHED" by the time the action in the past (missed 2 days of classes) occurred. Anyway, I passed my driving test! 2) I HAD BEEN TAKING ( why not "had took"?) lessons for six months, so I`m glad I finally have my license. You mean: "Why not "had taken"? (Past Perfect) because there is no pattern using "had took" It's because it is Past Perfect Progressive Tense. This tense is used when you want to express actions, more likely longer actions, or situations that were in PROGRESS before some other actions or situations in the past. The number 1) doesn't use Past Perfect Progressive Tense I think because "Miss" is a stative verb. Some verbs (called stative verbs) are not normally used in the progressive form. e.g. know, like, understand, believe, hear, etc. I was happy to hear you`re going to Paris this summer. 3) HAVE YOU BOOKED (why not "Did you book"?) the ticket yet? We must you use Present Perfect Tense for this sentence because the question mainly focus on the action "booked", whether you have booked or haven't booked yet. We don't use Simple Past Tense (Did you book) because if we want to use Past Tense, the main focus should be for the TIME. Here is the right usage: Did you book the ticket YESTERDAY? So, it emphasizes the time. That's when we use the Simple Past Tense But for your question, it doesn't emphasize the time in the past, but only focus on the action. So Present Perfect Tense is used.
January 27, 2015
2
I'll start with the easier one - 3. Always use present perfect with "yet" in this kind of sentence. "yet" indicates that something has not happened at any time during a period starting in the past and finishing in the present. The present perfect is used in this situation. Your usage of "miss" here is in the context of a regular activity. e.g. "I miss Downton Abbey every week because my husband watches the football on another channel." If you are "missing" it now. the meaning is different - you really want to see it e.g "I'm really missing my wife at the moment - I think of her all the time." Going back to the past perfect, your meaning of "miss" is like my first example - relating to a activity. Your choice of past perfect in this situation is not right. Past perfect is used to refer to a past event which happens earlier than a later past event. In your example, the later event is in the present ("I am glad ..."). You could say, "I had been taking driving lessons for 6 months when I decided to take the test. I passed and I am now glad I finally have my licence." The past perfect continuous is the right tense because the emphasis in that phrase is more on the activity itself, not the result of the activity. I imagine you in the car actually driving, with this tense. You could also have said : "I had taken lessons / I had learnt to drive for 6 months when I took my test." Here, I imagine you at the end of the 6 months (the time when you are describing the results of your efforts) and you are making the decision. Here past perfect simple is correct. Hope this helps! Kind regards, Michael
January 27, 2015
2
Hi Julia. You use the past perfect tense to indicate that one action was finished before another action was finished. -I missed two days of school. Before that I had not missed a day of school for two years. You use the past perfect continuous to indicate that the first action continued until the second action. With this tense we indicate the amount of time you did the action before the second action. The emphasis is on the amount of time. -I had been taking driving lesson "for six months" when I passed my driving test. -I had been working "for three hours" when I stopped for lunch. Present perfect. I like to think of the present perfect as speaking about experience. You are talking about something that did or didn't happen and can change. You could say. "Did you buy the tickets?" The word "yet" is like the word "since" because It needs the present perfect tense. Have you bought the tickets yet?
January 27, 2015
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