Everyday Grammar - VOA Learning English Fun with Future Tenses - December 12, 2024
Dec 12, 2024
A lively tour of English future tenses with clear examples and common pitfalls. Topics include using will for offers, be going to for planned actions, and the informal gonna. Discussion covers shall as a formal/old-fashioned form, present tenses for scheduled events, future progressive for actions in progress, and frequent mistakes like time-clause errors and missing third-person s.
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Use Will For Simple Future And Offers
- Use will plus the base verb to form the simple future for decisions or offers.
- Jonathan Evans shows contractions like I'll or he'll are common in speech and can be hard for learners to hear.
Prefer Be Going To For Planned Actions
- Use be going to for plans made before speaking and will for spontaneous decisions or predictions without prior plans.
- Jill Robbins warns that going to often reduces to gonna in casual speech but avoid gonna in formal writing.
MacArthur Quote Shows Shall Is Formal
- Jill Robbins plays Douglas MacArthur's quote I shall return to show shall's historical use.
- She notes shall sounds formal and old-fashioned in American English but is more common in British English.