ENGLISH

REPORTED SPEECH

When do we use reported speech? Sometimes someone says a sentence, for example "I'm going to the cinema tonight". Later, maybe we want to tell someone else what the first person said.

Direct and indirect speech can be a source of confusion for English learners. Let's first define the terms, then look at how to talk about what someone said, and how to convert speech from direct to indirect or vice-versa.

We use a 'reporting verb' like 'say' or 'tell'.  If this verb is in the present tense, it's easy. We just put 'she says' and then the sentence:

• Direct speech: “I like ice cream”.
• Reported speech: She says (that) she likes ice cream.
• We don't need to change the tense, though probably we do need to change the 'person' from 'I' to 'she', for example. We also may need to change words like 'my' and 'your'
• (As I'm sure you know, often, we can choose if we want to use 'that' or not in English. I've put
  

  

  it in brackets () to show that it's optional. It's exactly the same if you use 'that' or if you don't use 'that'.)
  
  
  But, if the reporting verb is in the past tense, then usually we change the tenses in the reported speech:
  • Direct speech: “I like ice cream”.
  • Reported speech: She said (that) she liked ice cream.
  
  

CONDITIONALS

What are conditionals in English grammar? Sometimes we call them 'if clauses'. They describe the result of something that might happen (in the present or future) or might have happened but didn't (in the past) . They are made using different English verb tenses.

The Zero Conditional:

(if + present simple, ... present simple)

If you heat water to 100 degrees, it boils

The First Conditional:

(if + present simple, ... will + infinitive)

If it rains tomorrow, we'll go to the cinema..

The Second Conditional:
(if + past simple, ... would + infinitive)
If I had a lot of money, I would travel around the world.

The Third Conditional
(if + past perfect, ... would + have + past participle)
If I had gone to bed early, I would have caught the train.

FALSE FRIENDS

are words in two languages (or letters in two alphabets)^[1] that look or sound similar, but differ significantly in meaning. An example is the English embarrassed and the Spanish embarazada (which means pregnant), or the word sensible, which meansthoughtful in English, but sensitive in French and Spanish.