Speak Success: Mastering the IELTS Speaking Journey – Chapter 5
Introduction
Welcome to Lesson 5 of the SpeakSuccess: Mastering the IELTS Speaking Journey. Today’s focus is on IELTS Grammar Accuracy, an essential aspect of your IELTS Speaking score. Correct grammar usage reflects your language proficiency and helps convey your ideas clearly and effectively. This lesson will cover basic tense review and usage, common subject-verb agreement errors, and the importance of grammatical variety in your responses.
Verb Tenses
Understanding and using all verb tenses accurately are crucial for expressing time, sequence, and nuances in your English speech. Here’s an expanded overview of all primary verb tenses in English, with examples tailored for IELTS Speaking proficiency.
Simple Tenses
1. Simple Present
- Usage: For habitual actions, general truths, and states.
- Example: “I study English every evening.”
2. Simple Past
- Usage: For completed actions at a specific time in the past.
- Example: “I visited the museum yesterday.”
3. Simple Future
- Usage: For actions that will happen in the future.
- Example: “I will start a new book tomorrow.”
Continuous (Progressive) Tenses
4. Present Continuous
- Usage: For actions happening at the moment of speaking or current temporary situations.
- Example: “I am studying English right now.”
5. Past Continuous
- Usage: For actions that were in progress at a specific moment in the past.
- Example: “I was watching a movie when he called.”
6. Future Continuous
- Usage: For actions that will be in progress at a specific time in the future.
- Example: “I will be travelling to New York this time next week.”
Perfect Tenses
7. Present Perfect
- Usage: For actions that happened at an unspecified time in the past or that started in the past and continue to the present.
- Example: “I have studied English for five years.”
8. Past Perfect
- Usage: For actions that were completed before another action or time in the past.
- Example: “I had finished my homework before the movie started.”
9. Future Perfect
- Usage: For actions that will be completed before a specific time in the future.
- Example: “By next year, I will have completed my English course.”
Perfect Continuous Tenses
10. Present Perfect Continuous
- Usage: For actions that began in the past and continue to the present, especially with emphasis on the duration.
- Example: “I have been studying English for over an hour.”
11. Past Perfect Continuous
- Usage: For actions that were ongoing in the past and continued up until another action in the past.
- Example: “I had been waiting for the bus for 30 minutes when it finally arrived.”
12. Future Perfect Continuous
- Usage: For actions that will be ongoing in the future and continue up until another specific time or action in the future.
- Example: “By the time you arrive, I will have been studying for three hours.”
Irregular Verbs
Not all verbs are created equal. The English language has more than 200 irregular verbs where the inflections are not -s, -ed, or -ing. We’ve compiled 181 of these verbs which you can explore here!
Activity for Practice
Verb Tense Conversion: Take a simple sentence and convert it into all other tenses, noting the changes in meaning. For example, start with “I study English.”
- Simple Present: “I study English.”
- Simple Past: “I studied English.”
- Simple Future: “I will study English.”
- Present Continuous: “I am studying English.”
- …and so on through all 12 tenses.
Common Subject-Verb Agreement Errors
Subject-verb agreement is crucial for grammatical accuracy. The subject and verb must agree in number (singular or plural).
- Singular subjects need singular verbs. Example: “She speaks English fluently.”
- Plural subjects require plural verbs. Example: “They speak English fluently.”
Common errors:
- Misidentifying the subject of a sentence.
- Forgetting irregular verb forms.
Activity: Correct sentences with subject-verb agreement errors and create five of your own sentences, emphasizing subject-verb agreement.
Importance of Grammatical Variety in Responses
Using a variety of grammatical structures enriches your speech and demonstrates your language proficiency.
- Conditionals: for hypothetical situations. Example: “If I had more time, I would travel more.”
- Passive voice: to focus on the action or the object of the action. Example: “The book was written by George Orwell.”
- Complex sentences: using subordinate clauses to show relationships between ideas. Example: “Although it was raining, we decided to go for a walk.”
Activity: Rewrite simple sentences using a variety of grammatical structures to enhance complexity and interest.
Vocabulary List
- Conjugate (verb) [ˈkɒn.dʒʊ.ɡeɪt]: To change the form of a verb in an inflected language such as English to indicate tense, mood, person, etc. Example: “We need to conjugate the verb correctly to match the subject.”
- Clause (noun) [klɔːz]: A group of words containing a subject and predicate and forming part of a sentence or constituting a whole simple sentence. Example: “A complex sentence has one independent clause and at least one dependent clause.”
Accuracy in grammar is not just about avoiding mistakes; it’s about confidently communicating your thoughts in a clear and precise manner. By focusing on tense usage, subject-verb agreement, and grammatical variety, you’re well on your way to improving your grammatical accuracy for the IELTS Speaking test. Practice regularly, and don’t hesitate to seek feedback on your speaking from teachers or peers. Remember, grammar is the backbone of effective communication. Mastery over grammatical structures will not only boost your IELTS score but also your overall confidence in English-speaking scenarios. Stay tuned for more lessons in our SpeakSuccess series, designed to help you achieve speaking excellence.
