Gendered pronouns – when to use he, she and it for animals, objects and people
Gender in English is quite different to many languages because objects are generally always treated as neutral, and animals are mostly treated as neutral, even when they have a gender. The result is that the pronouns “he” and “she” are almost always used to refer to...
The Present Participle in Mixed Tenses – Exercise
The present participle is a grammar word with many different uses. Some uses are very particular, and depend on its relationships with other verbs (such as following a verb with either an infinitive or +ing form). One of its most common, and most formulaic uses, is in...
When to use past participles with perfect tenses
Past participles have a number of uses, though mainly they are used for forming grammatical structures such as perfect tenses (We had discovered a key.) or as an adjective form of a verb (We took the discovered key.). In the perfect tenses, past participles come after...
Spelling rules for verb tenses and participles
As with most areas of the English language, forming different tenses from verbs has some basic rules which can be frequently broken. With irregular verbs, there is often there is no easy way to know how a verb should be spelt in its present or past forms, or as a past...
Identifying the bare infinitive – exercise
Understanding what the bare infinitive is, how we use and when we use it is a very important building block for effective English grammar skills. My article on the bare infinitive (from The English Tenses Practical Grammar Guide) should give a solid understanding of...Want to Master English?
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