Skype classes 2018

Great news everyone!!!

If you have checked our website recently you may already have seen this. Scroll down for details!

• 12-lesson courses available
• 2 different levels: B1/B2 and B2/C1
• Every Friday with 2 different timetables available: 16:45 – 17:30h or 18:00 – 18:45h
• 9 students per class maximum!
• All lessons have been designed by ES teachers to ensure maximum quality!
• Limited vacancies!

These lessons are the result of the students’ petition of reinforcing the concepts learnt in class at home as well as the relentless introduction of technology in all aspects of our daily life. The advantages of online classes are multiple:

1. You can learn English by attending a presential class guided by one of our teachers (who may even be your own ES teacher) from home
2. You will improve your listening skills with the extra challenge of not relying on body language.
3. You will improve your writing and summarizing skills, as you’ll contact the teacher in the ‘question time’ via chat.
4. You will share the class with 8 other students who have your same level, and the answers to all the questions in the class, as well as the teachers’ written explanations, will stay in the chat for future reference.

So, what are you waiting for? Ask for information at reception in any of our schools before we run out of vacancies, the future is waiting for you!

 

It’s tea time!

Hello everyone!

Is there anything more British than a good cup of tea? I don’t think so. British people have had an affair with the cuppa for centuries, and yet tea is not originally from the UK.

Present Perfect vs Past Simple

Hello everyone!

Today we are going to talk about a grammar point that is usually quite a pickle for students up to Upper-Intermediate level: Present Perfect vs Past Simple.

Let’s start thinking about TIME, not about tenses, but about time. There are only 3 times: PAST – PRESENT – FUTURE

In this way, we hardly ever doubt when we need to use Past Simple. We simply use it to talk about an action that started in the past and finished in the past.

E.g: “What did you do last weekend?”

We use the Past Simple because the weekend started and finished in the past time.

So, when do we use the Present Perfect tense?

The present perfect is a tense that connects past time and present time.

E.g: When we ask ‘Have you been to Paris?’ what we mean is ‘Have you been to Paris at any time from the moment you were born until now?’

In this way, we can learn a lot about the time we are talking about if the person we are talking to uses the correct tense. We can use Past Simple or Present Perfect in the same sentence, depending on when we are saying it.

Let’s take a look at these sentences as an example:

a)      ‘Did you see Mary this morning?’

As we can see, part of today is in the past time, so when I say ‘Did you see Mary this morning?’, I am doing it because it’s either the afternoon, evening or night of the same day, so the morning already belongs to the past time. You can see it better in the following timeline:

This is today:

Let’s imagine that it’s 5 o’clock in the afternoon and you will see how part of the day belongs to the past, other part to the future and how the present is just 17’00h:

b)        ‘Have you seen Mary this morning?’

If I use the Present Perfect tense in this sentence is because the morning is not over, so it started in the past but continues in the present.

We could use this sentence if, for example, it was 11.30 in the morning:

To review all past tenses, we recommend you check the following podcast: ‘The mystery story’, it’s great practice and great fun!!!

I hope this post has helped you to clarify the use of these tenses and remember: everything’s about time! 😉

Have a great week! 😀

T                             O                            D                            A                            Y

Now, this is today: