Concepts and Usage of Simple Present Tense for Describing Habitual Actions - Coursework Example

Concepts and Usage of Simple Present Tense for Describing Habitual Actions Only a better understanding of the matter will help a teacher to guide her students to the maximum learning experience of the grammar and mechanics of any language. This paper attempts to make such an understanding in a particular area of grammar, i.e., use of simple present tense to describe habitual or routine actions. The paper looks into this area with all its dimensions such as definition and meaning of various sentence types and the practical methods to present the item suitably in the class. It also includes a discussion of the possible errors that an ESOL student may commit while using simple present tense and attempts to suggest possible remedial measures to tackle these problems. A particular tense of a language expresses the time of an action whether it be present, past or future. In English, change in verb form differentiates various tenses and subsequently brings about a change in the meaning conveyed. However, some languages do not follow this rule. For example, in Chinese, tense is not expressed by a change in verb or auxiliary, but by the use of adverbs of time. In all languages, grammarians always plunge into heated discourse about the exact number of tenses in their languages. Even though some modern grammarians speak only of two tenses in English, their counterparts divide the tense form in English into three: present tense, past tense, and future tense. Present tense is primarily used to refer to actions, conditions, or states that occur in the present. Present tense is divided into present simple, present progressive or present continuous, present perfect, and present perfect progressive. Simple Present Tense, just as the word indicates, is the simplest form of the tense. To formulate a sentence in this tense, one needs to use the simple present form of the verb with the subject (subject+ present tense form of the verb). Every tense has its own usages. We use simple present tense in the following situations: 1. To express a habitual or repeated action: E.g., My friend takes milk every morning. 2. To express general truths: E.g., Honey is sweet. 3. To indicate a future event that is part of a fixed arrangement: E.g., We sail for London next Sunday. 4. To express actions in the present, which follows one after the other: E.g., First I get up, then I take breakfast. 5. To give instructions (see imperative sentences as well): E.g., open the window. 6. It is also used with special verbs especially with verbs that are not normally used in the continuous tense. E.g., ‘I understand French’, ‘I see an airplane’, and not ‘I am seeing an airoplane’. The verbs in simple present tense should agree with its subject in number and person. Generally, a singular subject takes a singular verb and plural subjects take plural verbs. But in the case of Simple Present Tense one needs to use the singular form of the verb only with the third person singular pronouns (he, she, it) and their corresponding noun forms (such as Arnold, Catherine, My mother, His friend, her uncle, the dog etc). Thus, a third person singular subject always takes a singular verb, that is, it uses –s form of the verb. On the other hand, a plural subject takes a plural verb; that is, the base form of the verb. If the verb ends in -y preceded by a consonant, then the final -y will be replaced by –ies (examples: carry, pity, try, cry). If the verb ends in -sh, -ch, -ss, or -x (examples: wash, watch, kiss, relax), -es will be added and it will be pronounced as an extra syllable. The table below shows how this rule works. Subject Base form -s form I, We You, They, The teachers, My Parents etc.    write play walk carry He, She, It  writes plays walks carries In this essay, the focus is on the use of simple present tense to indicate habitual or routine actions in relation to various sentence types. When simple present tense is used to show habitual actions, some signal words are used to show regularity. Some of these words are: every day, often, always, sometimes, and never. However, usually, even without these signal words the sentence conveys the meaning. In many cases, they are added to emphasize regularity. Simple present tense representing habitual action can be expressed in three types of sentences: affirmative sentences, negative sentences, and questions. The teacher needs to introduce all these forms of the tense through meaningful interactive activities, by eliciting the students’ responses and making them take part actively in all the learning activities.  Affirmative sentences in the Simple Present Tense:- An affirmative sentence is a positive sentence that states something. In these sentences, the verb follows the subject. E. g;   Teaching of affirmative sentences showing habitual or routine actions is comparatively easier than the two other forms. All that the teacher has to do in an ESOL class is to initiate a conversation. For example, the teacher can ask the student to talk about the activities that he or she performs every day (see the various activities suggested in Appendix 1). A simple narrative of the household activities, or practices at the college would help in this matter. Another activity that the teacher can evolve is to conduct mock interviews. Please refer to the model given below: Read the following interview using the simple present tense: John: Hello, Can I ask you some questions for an interview? Anne: Yes, I can answer some questions. John: Thank you for taking the time. Now, first question: What do you do? Anne: I work in a library. I am a librarian. John: Are you married? Anne: No, I am not. John: What does your father do? Anne: He works as a police officer. John: Do you usually go for a movie? Anne: Yes, I do. John: How often do you exercise? Anne: I sometimes exercise four times a week. However, I usually exercise only twice a week. John: Where do you like going on holiday? Anne: We rarely go on holiday. However, we like going to the mountains if we can. John: What type of books do you read? Anne: I often read horror stories. John: Thank you very much for answering my questions. Anne: Youre welcome! Negative sentences: The sentences that express a negation are called negative sentences. In simple present tense, we make negative sentences by adding dont or doesnt before the simple form of the verb. I don’t walk ten kilometers everyday. He doesn’t drink lot of water everyday. The machine doesn’t work well. John doesn’t go to bed early. They don’t watch the news so eagerly. The methods used for teaching the formation of positive sentences can be applied for negative sentences as well. Below are some other methods to help the students to form negative sentences. For example, the teacher provides a sentence in the affirmative; students change it into negative. 1. Teacher: The earth moves round the sun. Student: The earth doesn’t move around the sun 2. Teacher: We go for a walk in the morning. Student: We don’t go for a walk in the morning. 3. Teacher: My watch keeps good time. Student: My watch doesn’t keep good time. 4. Teacher: The boy takes exercise everyday Student: The boy doesn’t take exercise everyday. 5. Teacher: William knows Maria Student: William doesn’t know Maria. Question sentence: The sentence that expresses a question is called an interrogative sentence or a question sentence. The questions that are formed in this tense can be either ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions or the WH questions. Again, remember that this question can be either positive or negative. Yes/no questions: They are also created using the auxiliary do or does. This time, the auxiliary is placed before the subject and the subject is placed in between the auxiliary and the verb. However, students are to be told that one always has to use the base form of the verb when asking questions in the simple present form. Here are some examples: Subject Auxiliary Example I, we, you, they Do Do I play football? Do we play football? Do you play football? Do they play football? He, She, It Does Does he play football? Does she play football? Does it work well? In an interactive class, a creative teacher can make use of many techniques to teach simple present question sentence for habitual action. The teacher can tell the students to conduct a real survey among the classmates on a particular topic. It is better to allow them to create their own questions while the teacher can give necessary corrections. Students are divided into small groups and each group has to create one survey. Students can also use computer lab to develop questionnaires. Under each questions four options can be given which say “always”, “sometimes”, “rarely”, “never”. The question sentences should be built around assigned topics such as hobbies, entertainments, family, music, food, English and sports. When the drafts are in the final form, the teacher collects and corrects them. Then multiple copies should be taken so that each student gets a copy of the survey. The students should be given enough time to respond to the survey. They should be encouraged to clarify doubts to the concerned group that has constructed it. After the completion of the survey the students have to return to their groups and collect the responses to the survey that they created. Then each group should present the results of the survey in the class. It is to be noted that affirmative sentences also can be used instead of questions as per the curricular objective. A sample survey on sports is given below: 1. Do you play football? Always Sometimes Rarely Never 2. Do you watch football? Always Sometimes Rarely Never 3. Do you play Tennis? Always Sometimes Rarely Never 4. Do you watch Tennis? Always Sometimes Rarely Never 5. Do you play Baseball? Always Sometimes Rarely Never 6. Do you watch Baseball? Always Sometimes Rarely Never It is a common error committed by language teachers to understand and teach the meaning of a sentence when they teach the meaning of a tense. They tend to forget that meaning is created by tense, rather than by sentence. In primary classes, teachers introduce simple present tense, which shows habitual action, by presenting some cliché examples like ‘Henry goes to college everyday,’ or so. Even all the books and references on grammar explain tenses in the same manner. After citing the example, it is natural that the teacher may ask a question like ‘can you see the possibility of a habit here?’ There, the student accepts that possibility. Then the teacher states that simple present tense is used to express a habit. So the student takes that particular sentence as an example of habitual action. However, in secondary classes, some students may ask if the meaning of the sentence is clear from the sentence itself, why we have used simple present redundantly to express habitual action. There is nothing wrong in his question, but the problem lies in the root itself. He has studied the use of habit based on sentence rather than in tense. The words of Carter (1997: 34) is to be remembered by all modern language teachers: Language in the classroom is not to be encountered wholly by unconscious, implicit and indirect means but they have to see through language in a systematic way and to use language discriminatingly. So, the error can be rectified if the teachers in the primary classes give attention to the right aspect of teaching tense. ESOL Students are prone to commit several common errors when using simple present tense. It is so common that in an essay or in narrative, the speaker may shift from one tense to another. There are many reasons behind such shifting of tenses. Non-native speakers often take tense strictly for time. He may be under the impression that present tense is used only to indicate present actions or habitual actions. E.g., Catherine takes his hands and kisses him. He stood there without speaking anything. Students also tend to be confused between the use of present progressive and simple present tense. When one says, ‘I am walking two kilometers’, it refers to a semantic present. When we have to mention the habit of walking two kilometers everyday, we have to use present simple: ‘I walk two kilometers everyday’. Another mistake is the omitting of –s form in verb after third person singular subject. This generally happens due to carelessness and difficulty in determining the subject. It is also frequent when a collective noun becomes the subject. When the collection is thought as a whole, it takes a singular verb. Learners, for example, in a sentence like, ‘The committee selects the members’, may take ‘the committee’ for a plural noun. It is same in the case of each, every, neither…nor, either…or, etc. The teacher has to take care of all these aspects, and in the learning process he should make the students focus clearly upon each of these rules. Some errors and its corrected versions are given below: Errors Corrected Form My father work very hard. My father works very hard. His parents works in Canada. His parents work in Canada. Everyone go to school. Everyone goes to school. Jerome as well as Linda get up early in the morning. Jerome as well as Linda gets up early in the morning. Either Tom or Joe go to the market. Either Tom or Joe goes to the market. Spelling errors may occur due to the unawareness of the use of –s, -es, -ies. Usually, -es is added to the verb when it ends in -sh, -ch, -ss, x, and it is pronounced as an extra syllable (examples: wash, watch, kiss, relax). When the verb ends with –y preceded by a consonant, -ies is used by omitting the final –y (examples: carry, try, cry). These errors can be rectified from the primary classes onwards using spelling games such as spelling net, fix-the-tail game etc. In negative sentences, when the verb is third person singular, instead of ‘don’t ’, ‘doesn’t’ is used: Example: He doesn’t go to the beach everyday. They don’t do the home works properly. In question sentences also, since the auxiliary comes before the verb, ESOL students find it difficult to follow subject-verb agreement. Another problem faced in questions is the unnecessary use of –s after the verb. This paper is an endeavor to understand and define the use of simple present tense to indicate the habitual or routine actions. The matter discussed in the paper offers help to empowering teachers to assist students with their problems in learning grammar, especially in the particular area mentioned above. The first step in effective teaching is always considered as subject competency. The understanding of the subject should be complete and comprehensive. That means the teacher has to be equipped with the knowledge of all the aspects of the particular area that he or she deals with. As a grammar teacher, he/she should be aware of various linguistic and semantic levels at which errors may occur. She should be well prepared to predict and rectify those errors.   Bibliography Carter, R. (1997). ‘The new grammar teaching’ in Carter R Investigating English discourse Routledge. London: pp 19-35.             Appendix 1 Suggested Activities in the Classroom Activity No 1: Affirmative Sentences The teacher elicits responses from the students regarding the regular activities they do:- Student one: I get up at five everyday. Student two: I brush my teeth twice a day. Student Three: We play football on Sundays. The teacher, then, makes them repeat the sentences in the emphatic way:-  Student one: I do get up at five everyday. Student two: I do brush my teeth twice a day. Student Three: We do play football on Sundays. Activity No 2: Affirmative Sentences with Third Person Singular nouns:-  The teacher asks the students regarding the regular actions done by their father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, friend etc and elicits responses from them:-  Student one: My mother gets up at five everyday. Student two: Rajas brushes his teeth twice a day. Student Three: My brother plays football on Sundays. The teacher, then, makes them repeat the sentences in the emphatic way:- Student one: My mother does get up at five everyday. Student two: Rajas does brush his teeth twice a day. Student Three: My brother does play football on Sundays. Activity No 3: Affirmative Sentences The teacher calls one of the students forward and asks him to share his daily routine:- student1: I get up at six and brush my teeth. Then, I take a cup of tea...........and go to bed by 11 p.m.  The teacher calls another student forward and asks him to share the daily routine of his/her mother:- Student 2: Good morning friends. My mother gets up at four. After brushing teeth she prepares tea......and she goes to bed by 11 p.m.             Read More