English Grammar Tenses- Help would be very much appreciated

Ooops, I forget my grammar. Wanted to help but got stuck as I forgot the terms..

Seems quite simple but I don't feel qualified to answer.

But if you ask, in the future, I'll continuously be standing at St Pancrace, at 5:00, for example...

i) I’ll do it later. A. future continuous
ii) I was there just last Thursday. D. past simple
iii) I’ve seen him before. C. present perfect simple
iv) He’s been engaged for ages. H. present perfect continuous
v) I get up at 6. G. present simple
vi) I was waiting for half an hour before you showed up! F. past continuous
vii) I’ll be standing at Waterloo Station at 5.00. B. future simple
viii) By the time the police arrived the burglars had escaped E. past perfect

That's a first stab, don't trust me.
Damn, this reminds me of the italian trapassato..

I wouldn't trust that, indeed, Osso...

Is that conditional?

It is, Osso, I couldn't be that imperative...

i) I’ll do it later. will used to denote a future action
ii) I was there just last Thursday. past tense
iii) I’ve seen him before. present tense, present perfect aspect
iv) He’s been engaged for ages present tense, present perfect aspect
v) I get up at 6. present tense used to denote habitual action
vi) I was waiting for half an hour before you showed up! past tense, continuous aspect & past tense
vii) I’ll be standing at Waterloo Station at 5.00. will used to denote a future action
vii) By the time the police arrived the burglars had escaped past tense & past tense, past perfect aspect

One tag, 'Efl' for the Pentacle Queen. Why, 'cause she's from England?

I'll admit I never heard of those tenses and was guesstimating. Italian has complex tenses that were hard to knock into my head back in the early nineties (and I wasn't the only one) and that I've somewhat lost quick understanding of since my classes, what with little practice. But my moment in time understanding them is what triggered my conjecture here, however wrong I may be.

I've done them one way, but I'm quite sure that it's not the way that you're really looking for, PQ.

Why not give them a whirl before I give the second set? It's not really that complicated. The words describing the "tenses" are all English words that, after a fashion, correspond to the "tenses".

That's what I was speaking of, Talk. Consider just how well English speakers use all these grammatical structures, in this case, different verb forms, yet so few really feel comfortable with the terms that are used to describe them.

Strange, no, not really. Those names mean nothing to us as ideas pour from our mouths; not knowing those names doesn't prevent any one of us from deploying just the one we need when we need it.

Clue: 'will' indicates future; verbs ending in '-ing' indicates continuous; 'have' indicated completion; 'had' indicated past completion.


i) I will do it later - B. future simple
ii) I was there just last Thursday - D. past simple
iii) I have seen him before - C. present perfect simple
iv) He has been engaged for ages - C. present perfect simple
v) I get up at 6 - G. present simple
vi) I was waiting for half an hour before you showed up! - F. past continuous
vii) I will be standing at Waterloo Station at 5.00 - A. future continuous
vii) By the time the police arrived the burglars had escaped - E. past perfect

A. future continuous
B. future simple
C. present perfect simple
D. past simple
E. past perfect
F. past continuous
G. present simple
H. present perfect continuous

Tutorial
http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbtenseintro.html
http://www.learnenglish.de/grammar/tensetext.htm

@JTT:

I've lived here for ten years and I ain't never moving.

I've been living here for ten years.



I'm playing tennis with Mabel next week.

Here goes the difference between descriptivists and prescriptivists...

We are talking about simple sentences.

Have indications a period and ends so there is completion.

Grammar doesn't exist in isolation, Talk. Even the simple sentence,

I've lived here for ten years.

doesn't absolutely indicate a completion. It might, as in,

[Said on the day when the lease has expired and the person no long has possession of the residence] I've lived here for ten years, but now it's time to move on.

[Can't the present perfect continuous, 'have been living', substitute here, in the speaker will continue to live "here"?]

Even though there is completion, this particular present perfect is the present perfect of current relevance/importance.

There are some differences between NaE, AuE and BrE on this use, perhaps that's where we see things a bit differently.

NaE is likely to use the past simple, "I lived here ... " unless the speaker wants to make the past action current to now, or the past action hold some "extra degree of importance.

You are just going off in a loop. PQ only wanted those simple sentences parsed into tenses listed above. I have helped her in that regard. You are trying to expound on grammar. She doesn't need it. She is English major maybe a bit rusty on grammar the same as me. Thanks all the same.

And a pretty damn good job you did of it.

You certainly don't have to engage in any extended discussion on grammar or anything, Talk, but this is Able2Know. That's where people offer advice on things that they have been able 2 know.

Might I ask, Talk, if BrE is your dialect, [PQ and any other Brits feel free to weigh in], would it be possible, possible not necessarily the norm/the usual, to have used the past simple, "I helped her ...", instead of the present perfect, above, in bold?