PRESENT PERFECT Vs PRESENT PERFECT CONTINUOUS

I noticed recently that there were not many activities on the blog for students in Upper waystage and higher. So, I thought that I should change that. Here is our first really specififc Upper Waystage entry. It is to identify the difference between the Present Perfect and the Prsent Perfect Continuous. It is from the website speak speak.

I like this activity because it gives you clear examples of the different pieces of grammar and then gives you a quiz to practice the different pieces. It also gives some fantastic examples of common mistakes that people make. here are the links, I hope you like them:

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/intermediate/present-perfect-simple-v-continuous
http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/intermediate/present-perfect-simple-v-continuous-2

PAST SIMPLE vs PRESENT PERFECT speak speak

Every time I teach an 'Ask Paul' class or students come up to me to talk about grammar, there is one area that they want to discuss: The Past Simple and Present Perfect. We have already done some cativities here on the blog, but let me give you some more examples of activities that can help you with these pieces of grammar.

These activities are from the website speak speak and are a great way to practice the grammar. They are great execrises because the page gives you examples of the grammar and tells you what is good and what is bad. You then have to fill in the gaps for each question. 

This is a great activity for Waystage level and above

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/intermediate/past-simple-or-present-perfect

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/intermediate/past-simple-or-present-perfect-2

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/intermediate/past-simple-or-present-perfect-3

PAST SIMPLE speak speak

This is our second blog entry from the site speakspeak. It has some good activities that you can use to practice. These are for the Past Simple, so they are good for waystage and higher. They look at the grammar in three ways:

1. The Past Simple
2. The Past Simple as Questions
3. Irregular Verbs in the Past Simple

In all of the cativities you get examples and you can check if your answers are correct or incorrect:

THE PAST SIMPLE

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/past-simple-tense

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/past-simple-tense-2

THE PAST SIMPLE AS QUESTIONS

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/past-simple-tense-questions

IRREGULAR VERBS IN THE PAST SIMPLE

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/irregular-verbs

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/past-simple-irregular-verbshttp://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/irregular-verbs-3

I hope you like them

PRESENT SIMPLE speakspeak

I recently found the website speakspeak, which is a very good resource to help you practice your English. I found some very good activities here for Survival level students. The grammar is the Present Simple. There are three phases for the exercises.

1. The Present Simple
2. The Present Simple as Questions
3. The Negative Present Simple

They are all gap-fill activities where you must type or choose the correct answer

THE PRESENT SIMPLE

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/present-simple

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/present-simple-2

THE PRESENT SIMPLE AS QUESTIONS

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/present-simple-questions

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/present-simple-questions-2

THE NEGTAIVE PRESENT SIMPLE

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/present-simple-questions-negatives-do-dont-doesnt-practice

http://speakspeak.com/english-grammar-exercises/elementary/present-simple-questions-negatives-do-dont-doesnt-practice-2

In all of these activities the website gives examples of the grammar you are using and it gives you the chance to check yur answers.

MODALS IN THE PAST British Council

This is the last of the British Council links that I am going to post this week. It is a good exercise that practices modals in the past such as Must have and might have. These are pieces of grammat that you will use in Upper Waystage.

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-exercises/modals-deduction-past

STILL, JUST, YET, ALREADY British Council

I have sent lots of British Council links to you so far this week. This is because its website is really good for practicing English. This exercise is great for Waystage students. It practices some of the words that you can use with the Past Simple and the Present Perfect.

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-exercises/just-yet-still-already

QUESTION TAGS British Council

This is a great activity for Waystage students. It is a piece of grammar we use a lot and one which we see in Waystage level two or three times. The activity is from the British Council and is very interactive. It is short and quite easy. You just need to fill in the gaps.

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-exercises/question-tags

ARTICLES British Council

This is another exercise from the British Council. It is a good one for Survival level and above. It is designed to practice articles: a/an:/the. It is very simple, you just need to fill in the gaps with the correct article:

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-exercises/articles-1
http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-exercises/articles-2

COUNTABLES & UNCOUNTABLES British Council

I recently went on the website of the British Council, which is an organisation that teaches English all around the world. it has a great website with some very good interactive grammar exercises. If you take a look here, we have an activity about countables and uncountables. In both the activities you get a good explanation first and then there is an interactive game to play. It is a great way to practice.

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-reference/countable-uncountable-nouns-1
http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/grammar-reference/countable-uncountable-nouns-2

PRESENT SIMPLE englishgrammarsecrets

I love the website englishgrammarsecrets.com. I think it is a great oplace to help your practice your English. These are three exercises for students from Survival and above. They help practive the Present Simple and Auxiliaries.

http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/presentsimple/exercise2.swf

This activity practices using the auxiliary 'do'. It is very simple, but also very good;

http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/presentsimple/exercise4.swf

This activity practices the Present Simple and also vocabulary. You need to choose the correct verb for each space.

http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/presentsimple/exercise1.swf

This activity helps you practice the Present Simple. You need to match sentences to each other. It is simple, but it is good practice.

PRESENT SIMPLE QUESTIONS/SENTENCES

This is a great exercise for the Present Simple. It is not the same as the two games I also put on the blog. It is a bit more serious. But, it is good for practising two things:

1. Asking questions in the Present Simple
2. Making sentences in the Present Simple

http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=7303922934352445283#editor/target=post;postID=7637246660165610400

PRESENT SIMPLE & CONTINUOUS eslgamesworld

This is a great activity. It helps you practice two things:

1. Choosing between the Present Simple and Continuous
2. Choosing the correct verb for each situation

The game is hangman, where you have to guess the word based on the sentence and fill in the letters. It is quite easy, but it is fun and interactive

http://eslgamesworld.com/members/games/grammar/present%20tenses/present%20tenses%20hangman.html

PRESENT SIMPLE & CAN eslgamesplus

I love this activity! I like it for two reasons:

1. It is good for practising the Present Simple and Can
2. It is lots of fun and has a monkey in it!! That's right a monkey!! I love monkeys!!

It is an interactive activity where you need to fill in the gaps with the correct piece of grammar. If you get it right, the monkey dances - amazing!!!!

http://www.eslgamesplus.com/present-simple-tense-action-verbs-interactive-monkey-game/

PRESENT SIMPLE learnenglishfeelgood

A lot of Survival students recently asked me for exercises to practice. So, here we are. These exercises help you with the Present Simple. They practice using the Present Simple with:

• I
• You
• He/She
• We
• They

They are simple but useful exercises.

http://www.learnenglishfeelgood.com/esl-present-tense1.html

http://www.learnenglishfeelgood.com/esl-present-tense2.html

PRESENT PERFECT Englishgrammarsecrets

Englishgrammarsecrets is one of my favourite websites. It has lots of great activities that you can do to practice grammar. It is very interactive just like the multimedia you do at Wall Street. 

This first activity http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/presentperfectorpastsimple/exercise1.swf works on practicing the Present Perfect and the Past Simple. You have to slide the sentences into the correct bixes.

The second activity http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/presentperfectorpastsimple/exercise2.swf lets you practice each grammar tense by matching sentences together. It is good for context and structure.

The third activity http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/presentperfectorpastsimple/exercise3.swf is my favourite. It is a fill in the gap activity where you have to choose the correct tense based on the context of the sentence.

The fourth actiovity http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/presentperfectorpastsimple/exercise4.swf is really interesting. It is very much like Wall Street's multimedia. You have to pick the correct answer between the Past Simple and the Present Perfect.

There are four great activities here and if you do all of them I am sure you will understand this grammar much better.

PAST SIMPLE & PRESENT PERFECT eslcafe;com

Soooooooooo many students ask me about the Present Perfect and the Past Simple. It is the most common question asked by French students learning English. Therefore, I thought it would be gopopd to give you lots of ways to practice this. This is an activity from eslcafe that is very good.  http://www.eslcafe.com/quiz/past2.html . Once you have answered the questions, you can submit the answers and it shows you which ones you got correct.

COUNTABLES & UNCOUNTABLES eslcafe.com

eslcafe is a great website for you to practice on. There are lots of great quizzes and explanations. This is a very good activityu for Survival students (Or any students who want to learn a very importantt piece of grammar).

This activity http://www.eslcafe.com/quiz/count1.html practices using much/many with countable and uncountable nouns. It is a really good way to understand these.

MUSTN'T or DON'T HAVE TO Englishgrammarsecrets

This is a question that many many students ask me a lot. When should I use mustn't and when should I use 'don't have to'? This exercise is a great way to practice the difference between the two.

http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/musthaveto/exercise7.html

MUST FOR OBLIGATION Englishgrammarsecrets

This is a good activities to help you practice using 'Must' as an obligation. 

The first activity 
http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/musthaveto/exercise2.html gives you lots of examples in which we use must as a personal obligation. It is a simple exercise where you need to fill in the gaps with words at the bottom. I like it because it helps you see the situations in which we use 'Must' as an obligation; it gives you great context.

HAVE TO FOR OBLIGATION Englishgrammarsecrets

http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/musthaveto/exercise3.html is a great activity to help you practice using 'have to' as an obligation. It is very simple. You need to mix and match the sentences. I like it because it gives you a great context and allows you to see how we use 'have to'. Each sentence gives a good example of what you should do.

MUST & HAVE TO englishpage.com

This is a great exercise from the fantastic website Englishpage.com. It is an activity that helps you practice the difference between 'Must' and 'Have to'.http://www.englishpage.com/modals/interactivemodal2.htm It is quite a difficult exerciose because you need to think about:

1. Positive and Negative such as Don't have to and Must not
2. The past had to and the future will have to.

Some of the vocabulary in the sentences is quite difficult, so I would recommend this activity for Upper Waystage students and above.

INDIRECT QUESTIONS

This is a quiz that I found on the BBC website. It is a really good quiz if you want to sound like a British English speaker. We uise lots of the phrases here. It is also really good in helping you get indeirect questions which are very useful for Upper Waystage students. Here is the link: http://wsdownload.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/pdf/2010/01/100128093738_qnet_273_embedded_questions.pdf

PREPOSITIONS

Almost every student at WSI Nice asks me about prepositions and how to use them. I always say "They are difficult" and that students need to practice. here are some great exercises from the website englishpage.com

http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/time_prepositions_1.htm
http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/time_prepositions_2.htm
http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/location_prepositions_1.htm
http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/location_prepositions_2.htm

They are good for every level from Survival to Mastery. The activitites are very simple; all you need to do is choose the correct preposition for each sentence.

THE PAST

The websiote englishpage.com is a great resource. It has lots of very good activities to help you practice. It has lots of great activities to help you practice in the past. Here are a few to look at for now:

PAST SIMPLE Vs PRESENT PERFECT
http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbs5.htm
http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbs6.htm
These two are great for Waystage students and help to show the difference between the Present Percfect and Past Simple

PAST SIMPLE Vs PAST CONTINUOUS
http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbs3.htm
http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbs4.htm
These activities are good for Upper Waystage students and are a great way to improve your understanding of the Past Simple and Past Continuous.

'GET' from the BBC

Often in our ASK PAUL classes, students ask me how to use the phrase get. The hear words like 'get drunk' and 'get dressed' and are often confused. Here is a great exercise from the BBC to help with this. http://wsdownload.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/pdf/2012/01/120117160848_67_uses_of_get.pdf