Lesson 7

Common Writing Mistakes

#2
“The Clash of the Tenses”
Writer’s Prompt:
Create a humorous, rhetorical, or startling
statement hook for the following essay introduction:

Global warming proponents claim the earth will

gradually warm up over the next several decades. In fact,
they say it is warming right now. Today, in Troy, Missouri, it
is 20 degrees above zero. The proponents of global
warming need to rethink their position.
Assignments
Read all of Part One, 1984
Read Jack London’s “To Build A Fire” (Handout).
This will be used as the basis of your Literary
Analysis Essay which will be discussed next
class.

http://www.jacklondons.net/buildafire.h
tml
 Common Writing
Mistakes
Lesson #2
The Clash of the Tenses
Unnecessary tense
shift
"Tense" refers to the form of a verb that
indicates time. Unless you're referring to
different time periods, shifts in verb tense
create a garbled sense of when something is
happening.
Past, Present, Future -
Simple
In English, there are three basic tenses: past,
present and future
Perfect and Continuous
When a verb tense is “perfect” it indicates a set period
of time in which the action of the verb takes place.
“She has been to five movies.” (Present perfect)
“We had been with her often before her death.” (Past
perfect)
When a verb tense is “continuous” it indicates an
ongoing action.
“I am going to school.” (Present continuous)
“I was knitting.” (Past continuous)
Present Tenses
Simple present: She wants a drink.
Present continuous: They are walking home.
Present perfect: She has written five letters.
Past Tenses
Simple past: Peter lived in China in 1965.
Past continuous: I was reading.
Past perfect: We had been to see her several
times before she visited us.
Future Tenses
Simple future: Peter lives in China.
Future continuous: I will be travelling by
train.
Future perfect: We will have arrived in the
States by the time you get this letter.
Perfect Continuous
Present perfect continuous: You have been
waiting here for two hours.
Past perfect continuous: He had been
watching her for some time when she turned
and smiled.
Future perfect continuous: By the end of your
course, you will have been studying for five
years.
Use of Present Perfect

puts emphasis on the result Example: She has

written five letters.
action that is still going on Example: School has
not started yet.
action that stopped recently Example: She has
cooked dinner.
finished action that has an influence on the
present Example: I have lost my key.
action that has taken place once, never or several
times before the moment of speaking Example: I
have never been to Australia.
Unnecessary tense
shift
Follow the steps below to make sure your
tense forms are consistent from sentence to
sentence:
Select a passage of text and identify the tense
of all verbs and verb phrases.
Confirm that the actions described take place in
the same time period.
Unnecessary tense
shift
 Look at the following sentence, which shows tense
markers in italics:
 While Lee was answering the doorbell, the intruder
had entered through the bedroom window.
"While" signals that the action in the second clause
of the sentence occurs at the same time as the
action in the first clause. Yet the words "had
entered" indicates that the intruder entered before
Lee's action. The sentence shifts from the past
progressive tense—action in the past that is in
process—to the past perfect tense—action that
occurred prior to another action in the past.
Unnecessary tense
shift
Revision:
While Lee was answering the doorbell, the
intruder was entering through the bedroom
window.
Another example:
Naming the five best movies of last year was
easy. Ninety percent of the movies I see are
lousy, and that leaves only a handful that are
even worth considering.
Here, the sentence unnecessarily shifts from
the simple past tense ("Naming . . . was
easy") to simple present ("the movies I see")
to present progressive ("are even worth
considering").
Another example:
Revision:
Naming the five best movies of last year was
easy. Ninety percent of the movies I saw were
lousy, and that left only a handful that were
even worth considering.
If the actions occur in the same time period and
both are either in process or simple, make sure
that the tense forms of verbs and verb phrases
remain consistent.
In the following sentence, an activity that takes
place in the same time period takes different
tenses because that activity is described in
different ways:
Maria is always singing, and she sings beautifully.
Maria is always singing, and she sings
beautifully.
This sentence is correct. Here, the time period
remains the present, but the action described
shifts from the process of singing (present
progressive tense) to the simple act of singing
(simple present).
Remember: Avoid derailing your readers by
shifting tenses of verbs and verb phrases
unnecessarily.
Some more examples…
 Follow the steps in each of the examples to determine
if the verb forms that appear in italics need to be
changed.
Many people have studied the events that made
Salem, Massachusetts infamous.
Step 1. The first verb is in present perfect form; the
second is in the past tense.
Step 2. The actions do not take place in the same
time period: the first action is more recent than the
second.
Step 3. The sentence is correct.
In Class Exercises