Simple States or Passive Voice?
I recently had a question through this website but the return email didn’t work, so I’ve posted my answer in the hope that the reader sees it! It relates to spotting the difference between the past simple and the passive voice – specifically, how we...
When can we use the past simple for timeless rules?
When we write a rule in a past tense narrative, should it still be in the present simple tense? This was an excellent question raised by a reader, from a fairly unexpected source – this Christmas reading exercise. It contains the phrase “everyone knew how...
Why “keep doing” is present simple and not continuous
I’ve been asked about the tense of “keep writing” – and how it relates to the rules and patterns we use for the present continuous form of “to be writing”. Many verbs can be followed by other verbs in an –ing form, such as “keep doing”, “enjoy doing”, “avoid doing”...Forming Negative Simple Tenses – Exercises
Negative simple tenses are formed using either do, does, did, will or the verb to be and not, followed by the bare infinitive. Below is a group of exercises to test this understanding – using the information provides, form complete negative simple sentences. The...Want to Master English?
ELB has produced a series of bestselling English guides, available from all major retailers, with over 40,000 copies sold worldwide. Click a cover to learn more!
