WR090Skilled Writing through Inquiry: A Community of Scholars Examines Sustainable Food | Sustainable Agriculture

Tuesday, May 29, 2012Essay 2 Draft Review & More about *Verbs*

Essay Blueprint Review

• Does your paper conform to the directions?• Does the introduction describe a meal from the

planning through shopping , meal preparation, serving and sharing the meal?• Does the thesis state whether or not Michael Pollan

would approve of the meal?• Do the body paragraphs discuss how the meal

measures up to five of Michael Pollan’s rules?• Does the conclusion summarize the paper and

reiterate the thesis (in different words, of course)?

Verbs—Forming Different Tenses

• The verb world is divided into four different principle parts: • The basic form, which we form by naming the infinitive [to

be, to go, to study, to wait] and removing the “to.” • We use the basic form to form present , future, and perfect

tenses. • The present participle, which we form by adding an –ing to

the basic form [being, going, studying, waiting]. • The past form, which we form by adding an –ed to the basic

form for regular verbs, and we memorize for irregular verbs [was/were (irr), went (irr), studied, waited].

• The past participle, which is the same as the past form for regular verbs, and we memorize for irregular verbs [been (irr), gone (irr), studied, waited].

Irregular Verbs• Most grammatical errors occur when we are using one of the

past tenses of irregular verbs, so it is important to memorize the parts of these verbs that change.

• Luckily, patterns apply to the overwhelming majority of irregular verbs. Check these out:

Basic Past Past Participle• go went gone• be was been• eat ate eaten• forget forgot forgotten• run ran runFor a list of common irregular verbs, see http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/605/1/

Perfect Tenses• Perfect tenses are formed when we add a helping verb to

indicate a form of the past tense. • OWL has, arguably, the best reference I have seen ever on

what perfect tenses are and how they are best used.• Most of the verb form mistakes people from this region of the

country make have to do with the irregular verbs in past perfect tenses. Folks in this part of the world tend to use the past form in place of the past participle when they form the past perfect tense. For regular verbs, the past form is the same as the past participle, so there is no problem with regular verbs, just the irregular ones.

• Correct form: I had gone (not I had went)• Correct form: He had run (not he had ran)

Tense Overuse

• Every region of the country has its own special way of abusing verb forms, and especially the past tenses.

• Our special verb tense abuse occurs in the overuse of the past perfect tense.

• Most of the time, a simple past tense will do nicely.

• For example, instead of saying he had went to the store for more milk (very bad grammar) or he had gone to the store for milk (grammatically correct), most of the time we mean he went to the store for milk.

Homework Assigned

• Work on Essay 2 and bring what you’ve completed to class on Thursday, May 31st.`• Prepare for a short quiz on the Intro to Food Rules.• Read the handout on verb tense and helping verbs

and prepare for a short quiz on Thursday, May 31st.• In order to prepare for the quiz, complete the

exercises distributed in class. If possible, work these problems with others from class. You can check your answers by going to http://chompchomp.com/irregular02/irregular02.htm

• Bring your questions to class.