Teaching and Learning Tenses

                  Mc.Kay(1987: 5) suggests that a grid can be used to conrast particular verb tenses. For example, in  order to contrast the present proggressive and past tense,  the teacher might beginby giving a command to one of the student such as “ Open the window”. As student is opening the window, say “ Luvan is opening the window” After he has done this, say “ Luvan closed the window

PPRESENT	PAST
Luvan is opening	Luvan closed the window

Table 2. Teaching present and past tense

            There are two basic approaches are possible. First is an inductive approach in which the teacher strives to help students from generalizations themselves by providing many examples of a particular grammar point. For example, the teacher should hope that by using sentences which indicates what class members are doing or have done, students would see how the present progressive and past tense are formed in English.

            A second altenative is a deducative approach in which the teacher gives explicit attention to the differences in form. In this case, the teacher might ask several short questions such as the following, and then summarize the student responses

1.         What are the two verbs in sentence 1? (is opening) What has been added to the main verb (ing)

2.         What has been added to the main verb senteces 2 ? (d)

3.         Which senteces describe something that is going on at the present moment?