Tense

In our writing we use tense to tell the reader if the action is taking place in the present (the here and now), the past or the future.

It is common for students to make mistakes and have some of their writing in one tense (e.g the past) and then some in another (e.g the present). This is very confusing for the reader and should be avoided at all costs.

The way we change tense is by changing the form that the verb (the doing word) takes. At its sim-plest there are three tenses: past, present and future.

For Example:

The boy carried his mother. The boy carries his mother. | |

Past tense Present tense

The boy will carry his mother. | Future tense

These three differing types of tense can be thought of as ‘families’ of tense, within which there are other more precise ways of locating events.

Present Tense

In this family we include the simple present tense, the present continuous and the present per-fect.

Simple Present Present Continuous Present Perfect

she laughs she is laughing she has laughed

you think you are thinking you have thought

Sam works Sam is working Sam has worked

they eat they are eating they have eaten

The simple present tense indicates that something is generally true in an ongoing way. For exam-ple:

She laughs a lot.Street fighting is unlike professional boxing.

The use of the present continuous indicates that something is going on now. It is like a ‘tempo-rary present’ and its meaning is that of limited duration. This tense applies to processes which are currently happening.

He is carrying a large, heavy package.Peoples and governments are watching today.

As you can see from the examples, the present continuous always uses the present participle (the form od the verb with the ‘-ing’ suffix, along with an auxiliary verb [a small helper verb e.g - be, do, have])

The present perfect indicates that something which was begun in the past is still continuing or rel-evant to the present.

Timothy has lived a hard life.These techniques have been used to enhance the story.

The Future Tense

Simple Future Future Continuous Future Perfect

she will laugh she will be laughing she will have laughed

you will think you will be thinking you will have thought

Sam shall work Sam shall be working Sam shall have worked

The simple future tense uses the auxiliary (helper) verb ‘will’ or ‘shall’ to indicate that something will happen at a particular time in the future.

‘You will return to a normal life,’ said the priest.

The future continuous on the other hand combines the two auxiliary verbs ‘will’ and ‘be’ with the present participle that something will be going on at some time in the future.

They will be enjoying themselves on the pristine beaches oh Koh Samui in a few weeks’ time.

The future perfect combines the two auxiliary verbs ‘will’ and ‘ have’ with the past participle (e.g worked, thought) to indicate that something will have happened (or been completed) by a particular time in the future.

She will have thought long and hard about how to solve the problem.

The Past Tense

Simple Past Past Continuous Past Perfect

she laughed she was laughing she had laughed

you thought you were thinking you had thought

Sam worked Saw was working Sam had worked

The simple past represents a process that has happened and finished, and is often used in narra-tives or recounts located in a specific time int he past.

David arrived at the doorway.

The past continuous uses the auxiliary verb ‘to be’ in the past tense, along with a present par-ticiple to indicate that something was going on over a period of time in the past.It is like a ‘tempo-rary past’, used to refer to continued states or repeated actions or events which occurred in the past. The past continuous is often used in those parts of a narrative where the scene is being set, and precedes the use of the simple past to locate a specific even within the past.

I was thinking about the events of the day, when all of a sudden, the bird flew in front of me.

The past perfect is used to set up yet another type of relationship between two events in the past, one where a particular action or process is even further back in the past than another. In the follow-ing example, the past tense auxiliary ‘had’ combines with the past participle ‘given’ to refer to a process in the past (had given) that took place before another process in the past (disembarked).

The government had given the mothers proper education on basic hygiene before they disembarked.

Task

Identify the forms of the underlined verb group and its forms as simple, continuous and perfect.

1. We know that there have been problems with our class.

2. With the Declaration of the Rights of Man, the lower classes no longer told themselves, ‘I am

hungry, sick, overworked and poor because I am not as good as my rulers.’

3. We are, and always will be, the United States of America.

4. She was wondering if he had remembered their mother’s birthday.

5. Marian was painting all day yesterday and produced a stunning portrait.