Find your thin minute
Both listeners’ pages. Look at column one, minute by minute, and write the four numbers at the top of your notes.
Then find where your circles from column two cluster. In almost every case they sit in the minute with the fewest continuous verbs.
Six pairs. Match each correct sentence to the version it is usually produced as.
Two minutes of a real transcript
Minutes two and three, transcribed exactly
So I sat down on the stairs. The light went out and I stood up and I waved at it and it came on again. Then it went out again. My phone was going from eleven per cent to nothing.
A neighbour was coming past twice and she didn’t ask anything. I was wanting to say something and I didn’t.
Out of nowhere, my flatmate came home at eleven, like she always did on a Thursday. Meanwhile I was sitting there the whole time thinking about it.
Four questions about the transcript. Almost every sentence in it is grammatical.
1. The first paragraph has five past simple events in a row. What has been lost?
2. A neighbour was coming past twice. What is wrong?
3. Out of nowhere, my flatmate came home at eleven, like she always did on a Thursday. What is wrong?
4. Meanwhile I was sitting there the whole time. What is wrong with meanwhile?
Five families
An honest finding. Nobody breaks these rules in minute one. The background is planned, so it is there. By minute three the plan has run out and the tense stops being chosen at all.
Both directions appear at once, which looks like confusion and is not. It is what happens when a decision that should be made every clause stops being made.
The fix is not a better rule. It is having more background prepared than you think you need, so minute three has something to demote.
The five families, and what fixes each
| Family | Looks like | The question to ask |
|---|---|---|
| Event demoted | Did it happen a countable number of times? Then it is simple | |
| Background promoted | Was it a condition running through? Then it is continuous | |
| Layers swapped | Which one was longer? The longer one takes the continuous | |
| State verb in the continuous | Could somebody interrupt you halfway through it? | |
| Connector against its sentence | Does the connector agree with what follows it? |
The transcript from the input, repaired. One to four words per gap.
So I sat down on the stairs. The light out every ninety seconds, so I standing up and waving at it. My phone from eleven per cent to nothing. A neighbour past twice and did not ask anything. I to say something and I did not. , my flatmate came home at eleven, exactly as she always did on a Thursday. I had been sitting there for four hours.
Eight sentences, at least one from each family. Fix each and name the family.
1. I was ringing the bell three times.
2. The rain got heavier and heavier and the queue got longer and I got wetter.
3. I walked home when it started to snow.
4. She was seeming very tired that evening.
5. To make matters worse, the sun came out and everything dried.
6. Meanwhile I was standing there not knowing what to do.
7. He was closing the door and then he was locking it and then he was leaving.
8. It turned out that, she had known the whole time.
Both directions, at speed
Ten sentences from five-minute turns. Eight have one error; two are already correct.
1. I was waiting on the stairs for four hours.
2. I was checking my phone about forty times that evening.
3. The light kept going out and I stood up each time.
4. While she said that, I was understanding what she meant.
5. Out of nowhere, the bus arrived at exactly the time on the timetable.
6. The television played downstairs the whole evening.
7. I was about to giving up when I heard the lift.
8. He was always leaving the door unlocked and it was driving me mad.
9. Meanwhile, I sat there and I thought about it and I did nothing.
10. It was February and it was getting dark at five.
Four sentences have been removed. Put each back where its layer and its connector fit.
By eight o’clock the shop had been shut for an hour and I was still in the stockroom counting boxes that did not need counting. [1] The radio in the corner was playing something I had heard four times that day.
I was about to give up and go home when I heard the front door. [2] It was the area manager, who was supposed to be on holiday.
[3] She had driven ninety minutes to say it and she said it in about eleven seconds.
I locked up at half past nine. [4] I have never once been sorry about the ninety minutes she drove.
One to four words per gap. Ask the question every time: is this a condition, or a countable event?
The queue round the corner and it to rain. Two people in front of me about whether to give up. I my phone twice and put it away twice. Then a man in a high-visibility jacket out and said the machine was broken. , nobody moved. about forty of us just stood there in the rain for another ten minutes before anybody accepted it.
Be the editor
Task card · Pairs · Editing then speaking
Your partner’s column two from Lesson 5 — every place a layer collapsed. You are their editor.
Take four of them, repair them out loud, and name the family each belongs to.
- Name the family before you give the correction.
- At least one of your four must go in each direction — an event demoted, and background promoted.
- One of the four must be a connector rather than a tense.
- Then have your partner say the repaired version back twice, at conversational speed.
Then, ninety seconds each. Retell only your thin minute — the one with the fewest continuous verbs. Your partner counts them again.
Retelling one minute rather than the whole story is what makes the improvement measurable.
One of each direction
Four sentences. Two go each way. Fix each and say which.
1. I was ringing her three times before she answered.
2. It rained and the wind got worse and nobody wanted to leave.
3. I stood at the window when the car pulled up.
4. She was telling me the news and then she was leaving.
The decision every clause
Three questions.
1. Where in a five-minute story do the tense errors cluster?
2. I was ringing her three times. What is wrong?
3. Meanwhile means —
Before next lesson. Write your story out in full and mark every verb B for background or F for foreground, from the meaning alone. Then check the tense.
Bring it on paper. Next lesson you cut it to 230 words, and every B and F has to match its tense.