Past Tenses And Report Writing

A. Grammatical Structure: Past Tenses

Past tenses are used to narrate stories about past experiences. Past tenses are tenses normally found in narrative writing. Like the present tenses, they can be either active or passive.

• Past Simple

	Active	Passive
Statement	I (we) took	I/He/She/It was taken You/We/They were taken
Question	Did I (you, we, they) take? Did he/she/it take?	Was I/Are you (we, they) taken? Was he (she, it) taken?
Negative	I (you, we, they) didn’t take	I wasn’t taken You weren’t taken

• Past Continuous

	Active	Passive
Statement	I/He/She/It was taking You/We/They were taking	I/He/She/It was being taken You/we/They were being taken
Question	Was I taking? Were you taking?	Were you being taken? Was I being taken?
Negative	I was not taking You were not taking	I (you, we, they) had been taken You were not being taken

• Past Perfect Simple

	Active	Passive
Statement	I/You/We/They had taken	I/You/We/They had been taken
Question	Had I taken?	Had I been taken?
Negative	I had not taken	I had not been taken

• Present Perfect Continuous

I had been taking

Note: Take is an example of verb being used for the purpose of illustration.

i. The Past Simple Tense

The most common past tense is the past simple. Find seven examples of it – six active and one passive in this paragraph.

James saw the need for an efficient, regular

supply of good quality scrap metal

He also realised that his product was

good enough to be marketed over a wider area.

HE did not rely only on the Nairobi outlets.

He personally went to other major towns in Kenya

Very soon he was shipping off hundreds of bicycle

carriers direct to these towns by road and rail.

He even managed to get an export licence

for an order in Tanzania, and was only prevented

from completing this by difficulty over an export licence.

ii. The Past Continuous

The Past continuous tense is used for an event-in-progress in the past, not yet completed.

Very soon he was shipping off tens of dozens of bicycle….

Note the structure of tense:

was/were = -ing form (Active)

was/were being + Past Participle (Passive)

iii. The Past Perfect Tense

This indicates actions or events already completed before other past events

E.g.

….He moved nearer the city of Nairobi

here he proceeded to make, full time,

the braziers and water cans that he had previously

made inn his school holidays

Note once again the structure of this tense:

had + Past Participle (Active)

had been + Past Participle (Passive)

Note that Adverbs/ Adjuncts can come in the middle of words making up a tense. The use  of previously above is an example

The Past Perfect tense should not be confused with these forms

a) had = the Past simple of have, as in

b) had to = modal of obligation (really the Past of must), as in this example:

Each length of metal had to be heated and flattened at the extremity.

Note that the Present Perfect (have/has…) and the Past Perfect (had…) cannot be used interchangeably.

iv. The Past Perfect Continuous Tense

This indicates an event-in-progress before a past event. For example:

It was alleged that some students had been holding secret meetings

The structure is: had been + -ing form.

Using the Passive

Note that the passive is often used in technical or scientific English; For example

The test tube was heated and the results were noted.

Also it is often used when talking about situations when the person who performed situations when the person who performed the action is not known or important; for example

The informal economy is recognised as playing a very important part in a nation’s economic development.

There are many highly skilled people like James in road side workshops all over Nigeria, too. Follow the dialogue and list all the passives you can find

John:  Where’s Ali?

James: He’s been arrested

John: What for?

James:  He was caught turning Lagos City Council municipal dustbins into braziers

John:  That’s terrible news. What was he charged with?

James: He was charged with receiving stolen goods, I think.

John:  That’s serious, isn’t it! I wonder how the police found out?

James: I think they were tipped of by someone.

John:  You think he was betrayed? Who would do a thing like that?

James: Well, I’m not really surprised. Ali is recognised as one of the best metal workers in town. I can think of lots of people who will be glad that he’s been taken out of circulation!

Using would  and used to

You use the Past Simple to indicate either

1. a single past event or
2. a regular series of past events i.e. a past habit

You can express (2) in other ways:

• by using would + infinitive (basic form), e.g. He would make carts for other children
• by using used to + infinitive, e.g. When he was in primary school, James used to make wooden carts for other children

Used to is only suitable when the ‘habitual’ events are spread out over a period of time.

B. Skill Focus: More on report writing

The kind of writing we find in a report depends on its purpose. Thus a police report or a school prefect’s report of a case of fighting will be of the narrative kind, while a company chairman’s report to his shareholders will be more descriptive.

Recommendations can be included at the end, but they should appear to arise naturally out of the main body of the report. Headings and subheadings may be used and paragraphs may even be numbered. Here is another way of arranging a report i.e. the SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threat) analysis.

1. Purpose of the report
2. Background information
3. Strengths
4. Weaknesses
5. Oportunities
6. Threats
7. Conclusions
8. Recommendations

Newspaper reports have special features

• Paragraphs are short often having only one sentence. (Avoid this in your own writing)
• The first paragraph often gives a summary and is often in the resent perfect tense
• Other paragraphs form a kind of story and often use direct and indirect speech.

Writing Skill

Imagine when you were ten, you went home and stayed with your aged grandmother. She could still move about and always overjoyed to see any of her numerous grand children. In five sentences of continuous prose, describe what she regularly did every day while you were with her.

Write two versions of your account:

1. with all the main verbs in past simple tense

2. with all the verb phrase starting with would or used to

Common Errors: Used to

What is wrong with the following?

Femi is a very dutiful boy.

He use to visit his father’s  first wife every week.

She use to give him some tasty food and some pocket money.

These are wrong because you cannot combine use and to. You can only combine Used and to.

So how would you correct the above?

Are these sentences right or wrong? Correct them if they are wrong.

1. When I was at school, we used to cut grass every afternoon.
2. When I stay with my cousins, they use to tell them stories

Complete the following:

1. When Ali was very little, ____
2. Whenever Juliana wants to go to Lagos, ____

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