Monday Workshops L2, L3, MAG

Yesterday in class, I had groups 4A, 6, and 3B.

In groups 4a and 6, we listened to an episode "What Kind of Country" from NPR (National Public Radio - US) This American Life, discussing taxation in the United States. I gave a brief overview of the political beliefs of the right, or Republicans/Conservatives in the US as well as the Left/Democrats. I explained the differences between a Full Time (FT) and Part Time (PT) job. Even a Full Time job in the US does not entitle you to healthcare. Of the 55% of Americans who have health care, (which is the equivalent of l'assurance maladie and securité sociale, social security in the US in the money that seniors receive from the government when they are over 65 and retired), most Americans receive health care through their employers. The employer has a group healthcare plan for all their employees, and the employees pay for it through a portion (usually 10% of their salaries). Obama is trying to enact universal healthcare, but has not yet succeeded against the Republicans in our Senate.

In group 3B, I gave a basic grammar review on the difference uses between different past tenses in English. We have 3 basic kinds, which are the past simple, past continuous, and the use of past participle. The use of "to have" does not construct the past tense but the present-perfect, which most resembles the French past tense. The sentence construction, subject + "has" or "have" is NOT used the same as French past tense, causing many ESL French students to use "have" when they don't need to. There is a good explanation of this here. And even more, there is a large amount of verbs in the past tense that are irregular, and it's hard for students to learn and remember each one. We then used this information to tell stories of problems while traveling and corrected the stories together.

Simple Past
There are two principal past tenses used to make general statements about the past: The past simple and the past continuous. The two tenses are quite different. Use the past simple to talk about an event which happened at some point in time in the past.

Tom flew to Chicago last week.
Peter visited his friends in Florida two months ago.

Past Continuous
The past continuous is usually used to refer to events happening at the same time that something important happened in the past.

They were doing their homework when she arrived.
Jack was studying while Dave was cooking dinner..

The past continuous is also used to express what was happening at a precise moment in the past.
I was attending a lecture at 2.30 yesterday afternoon.
Alice was reading a book at six yesterday evening.

Past Simple Structure:
Positive
Subject + Verb + ed OR Irregular Past Form + Objects
I, You, He, She, We, They -> played golf yesterday afternoon.I, You, He, She, We, They -> went lunch at noon.

Negative
Subject + did not (didn't) + Verb + Objects
I, You, He, She, We, They -> didn't go on vacation last summer.
Subject + did not (doesn't) + Verb + Objects

Questions
(Why, What, etc.) + did + Subject + Verb + Objects?
Did -> I, you, we, they -> attend the meeting last week?

Past Continuous Structure:
Positive
Subject + conjugate the helping verb "be" + verb + -ing.
I was, You were, He was, She was, We were, You were, They were -> watching TV when I arrived.
Negative
Subject + conjugate the helping verb "be" + not + verb + -ing.
I wasn't, You weren't, He wasn't, She wasn't, We wasn't, You wasn't, They wasn't -> working when he came into the room.
Questions
Question word + conjugate the helping verb 'be' + subject + verb + -ing
What -> were you, they -> doing at seven o'clock?What -> was I, he, she -> doing at seven o'clock?

Study the Past Simple and Past Continuous in Depth:
Here are detailed guides to the past simple and the past continuous tenses.
Each guide provides situations, common time expressions used with the tense, as well as examples.
These guides were prepared especially for beginners and include dialogues and a short quiz.
Past simple with the verb "to be" for beginnersPast simple with regular and irregular verbs for beginners
It's also important to know your irregular past simple forms which are included in this list of the most important irregular past simple and past participle verb forms

Past Simple VS Past Continuous

You know Past Simple, here's a look further into Past Continuous, which is harder to grasp.

The Basics - Simple Past
There are two principal past tenses used to make general statements about the past: The past simple and the past continuous. The two tenses are quite different. Use the past simple to talk about an event which happened at some point in time in the past.

------ point in time, one moment something occurred ---- use PAST SIMPLE

Tom flew to Chicago last week. (point in time – last week; thing that occurred - Tom flys)
Peter visited his friends in Florida two months ago. (point in time – two months ago; occurred – Peter visits)

The Basics - Past Continuous
The past continuous is usually used to refer to events happening at the same time that something important happened in the past.

They were doing their homework when she arrived.
Jack was studying while Dave was cooking dinner.

The past continuous is also used to express what was happening at a precise moment in the past.
I was attending a lecture at 2.30 yesterday afternoon.
Alice was reading a book at six yesterday evening.
Past Simple Structure:
Positive
Subject + ( Verb + ed –OR– Irregular Past Form ) + Objects

I, You, He, She, We, They -> played golf yesterday afternoon.
I, You, He, She, We, They -> went lunch at noon.
Negative
Subject + did not (didn't) + Verb + Objects

I, You, He, She, We, They -> didn't go on vacation last summer.

Subject + did not (doesn't) + Verb + Objects
Questions
(Why, What, etc.) + did + Subject + Verb + Objects?

Did -> I, you, we, they -> attend the meeting last week?
Past Continuous Structure:
Positive
Subject + conjugate the helping verb "be" + verb + -ing.

I was, You were, He was, She was, We were, You were, They were -> sleeping when I arrived.
Negative
Subject + conjugate the helping verb "be" + not + verb + -ing.

I wasn't, You weren't, He wasn't, She wasn't, We weren't , They weren't ->
working when he came into the room.

Questions

Question word + conjugate the helping verb 'be' + subject + verb + -ing

What -> were you, they -> doing at seven o'clock?
What -> was I, he, she -> doing at seven o'clock?
Study the Past Simple and Past Continuous in Depth:

Here are detailed guides to the past simple and the past continuous tenses. Each guide provides situations, common time expressions used with the tense, as well as examples.
These guides were prepared beginners and include dialogues and a short quiz. You can use them to review.
Past simple with the verb "to be" for beginners
Past simple with regular and irregular verbs for beginners
It's also important to know your irregular past simple forms which are included in this list of the most important irregular past simple and past participle verb forms

Past Simple & Continuous

Simple Past
There are two principal past tenses used to make general statements about the past: The past simple and the past continuous. The two tenses are quite different. Use the past simple to talk about an event which happened at some point in time in the past.

Tom flew to Chicago last week.
Peter visited his friends in Florida two months ago.

Past Continuous
The past continuous is usually used to refer to events happening at the same time that something important happened in the past.

They were doing their homework when she arrived.
Jack was studying while Dave was cooking dinner..

The past continuous is also used to express what was happening at a precise moment in the past.
I was attending a lecture at 2.30 yesterday afternoon.
Alice was reading a book at six yesterday evening.

Past Simple Structure:
Positive
Subject + Verb + ed OR Irregular Past Form + Objects
I, You, He, She, We, They -> played golf yesterday afternoon.I, You, He, She, We, They -> went lunch at noon.

Negative
Subject + did not (didn't) + Verb + Objects
I, You, He, She, We, They -> didn't go on vacation last summer.
Subject + did not (doesn't) + Verb + Objects

Questions
(Why, What, etc.) + did + Subject + Verb + Objects?
Did -> I, you, we, they -> attend the meeting last week?

Past Continuous Structure:
Positive
Subject + conjugate the helping verb "be" + verb + -ing.
I was, You were, He was, She was, We were, You were, They were -> watching TV when I arrived.
Negative
Subject + conjugate the helping verb "be" + not + verb + -ing.
I wasn't, You weren't, He wasn't, She wasn't, We wasn't, You wasn't, They wasn't -> working when he came into the room.
Questions
Question word + conjugate the helping verb 'be' + subject + verb + -ing
What -> were you, they -> doing at seven o'clock?What -> was I, he, she -> doing at seven o'clock?

Study the Past Simple and Past Continuous in Depth:
Here are detailed guides to the past simple and the past continuous tenses.
Each guide provides situations, common time expressions used with the tense, as well as examples.
These guides were prepared especially for beginners and include dialogues and a short quiz.
Past simple with the verb "to be" for beginnersPast simple with regular and irregular verbs for beginners
It's also important to know your irregular past simple forms which are included in this list of the most important irregular past simple and past participle verb forms

Story Telling
Telling stories about yourself is a good way to practice expressing yourself in another language. It helps you to familiarize yourself with the words that you use in your native language, and their equivalent in English. People tend to tell the same stories over and over again, so it naturally gives you practice, by being able to repeat the story. Here are some examples of types of stories you might tell.

• Talking about an outing with your friends (dinner, hiking, the theatre, etc.)
• A story from a hard day at work, or a funny day at work
• Expressing how horrible or how awesome an ex-boyfriend/girlfriend was
• Telling someone about an awesome vacation you had, or just part of it.

Stories are told from beginning to end, like a film. However, you need words that will help you transition from one part of the story to the next, to show the order in which things happened. These words are known as linking words, and you should be familiar with most of them already.

Beginning
Firstly, First of all, To start off with, Initially,
Sidenote: You can also begin with when the story took place.
Yesterday, Last week, This morning, About a year ago, When I was,
Examples:
Firstly, I began my day by going to the Art Museum
First of all, I was at the bank in a long, long line.
To start off with, it was raining all day long, and we had forgotten our umbrellas
When I was living in Spain during my internship, I met a lot of cool people.

Continuing:
Then, After that, Next, As soon as / When + full clause, ... but then Immediately,
Sidenote: The order in which you choose to use these words is entirely up to you.
They are also optional. However, they help a story progress.
Then is probably the most regularly used, and it is often used repeatedly.
Examples:
Then, we had desert, and the waiter brought us free Champagne.
After that, I decided I would never date an American guy again!
Next, they decided to go skiing and I decided to drink hot chocolate in the lodge.
As soon as the train arrived, we realized we were on the wrong platform.
When I got to the ticket window, I couldn't find my wallet.
We thought we had enough gas to make it to the station, but then the car stopped.
Immediately, I came here to tell you about it.

Interruptions / New Elements to the Story:
Suddenly, Unexpectedly,
Examples:
Suddenly, this guy came stumbling down the street, completely drunk.Unexpectedly, they surprised me on my birthday.

Events Occurring at the Same Time
While / As + full clause During + noun (noun clause)
Examples:
While I was checking in to the hotel, my friends were buying groceries for the room.During the meeting, I was so bored, I mainly sat and drew pictures of my boss.

Ending:
Finally, In the end, Eventually, Lastly,
Examples:
Finally, I ended up going to my family dinner anyway.In the end, the flight was cancelled and we couldn't go on our trip.Eventually, the parade stopped and everyone went home.Lastly, it was decided to extend the trip by one more day.
Providing Reasoning
In addition to telling a story in a certain order, at times you will want to provide reasoning. Here are some examples of other words to use besides because to explain Why something happened.
Punctuation
When an adverb clause begins the sentence use a comma to separate the two clauses.
Example: Because he had to work late, we had dinner after nine o'clock..
When the adverb clause finishes the sentence there is no need for a comma.
Example: We had dinner after nine o'clock because he had to work late.
Because
• They received a high mark on their exam because they had studied hard.
• He works a lot of overtime because his rent is so expensive
Because can be used with a variety of tenses between the clauses.
Since
• Since he loves music so much, he decided to go to a conservatory.
• They had to leave early since their train left at 8.30.
'Since' means the same as because. 'Since' tends to be used in more informal spoken English. Important note: "Since" when used as a conjunction is typically used to refer to a period of time, while "because" implies a cause or reason.
As long as
• As long as you have the time, why don't you come for dinner?
'As long as' means the same as because. 'As long as' tends to be used in more informal spoken English.
As
• As the test is difficult, you had better get some sleep.
'As' means the same as because. 'As' tends to be used in more formal, written English.
Inasamuch as
• Inasmuch as the students had succesfully completed their exams, their parents rewarded their efforts by giving them a trip to Paris.
'Inasmuch as' means the same as because. 'Inasmuch as' is used in very formal, written English.
Due to the fact that
• We will be staying for an extra week due to the fact that we haven not yet finished.
'Due to the fact that' means the same as because. 'Due to the fact that' is generally used in very formal, written English.
Vocabulary
Try to use a variety of words to make your story more exciting. Early on in English writing classes, we are taught to stray away from words like “nice” and “bad”, because they are not very descriptive. They are generic and tend to be over used. Try to use interesting and more powerful words, like, “fabulous”, “beautiful”, “amazing”, “terrible”, “boring”, “awful” to help you exaggerate the main points of your story.
Practice
In class, we prepared stories to read to each other. We wrote 15 to 20 sentences minimum. The focus of this activity, as with all, is practicing your verbal speech. If you finish, please practice reciting it with another classmate.