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Reported Speech

This document summarizes the rules for reported speech in English. It explains that when the reporting verb is in the past tense, the tenses of the reported clause are typically changed to the corresponding past tense. However, modal verbs and expressions like "could", "should" change in specific ways. It also notes that questions are reported using "if/whether" and keeping the same word order as a statement but dropping any auxiliary verbs. The key changes are to tense when the reporting verb is past tense and how questions are structured in reported speech.

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Diana Gabriela
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50 views4 pages

Reported Speech

This document summarizes the rules for reported speech in English. It explains that when the reporting verb is in the past tense, the tenses of the reported clause are typically changed to the corresponding past tense. However, modal verbs and expressions like "could", "should" change in specific ways. It also notes that questions are reported using "if/whether" and keeping the same word order as a statement but dropping any auxiliary verbs. The key changes are to tense when the reporting verb is past tense and how questions are structured in reported speech.

Uploaded by

Diana Gabriela
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Reported speech

1. If the reporting verb is in the past there are some tense


changes:
Present Simple -> Past Simple
“I travel a lot for my job.” -> She said she travelled a lot for
her job.
Pres. Continuous -> Past Continuous
“The baby is sleeping!” -> He told me the baby was
sleeping.
Pres. Perfect -> Past perfect
“I’ve hurt my leg.” -> She said she had hurt her leg.
Past Simple -> Past perfect
“I lost my keys yesterday.” -> She said she had lost her keys
the day before.
Past Continuous -> Past perf continuous
“It was raining.” -> He said it had been raining.
Past perf -> Past perf
“I had tried everything.” -> He said he had tried everything.
- modal verbs change too
can->could / may->might/ must -> had to
- we don’t change: could, should, would, might, ought to,
used to
!! We don’t change must if it’s negative or if we deduce
something.
 When the reporting verb is in the present we don’t
change the tense:
“I want to get some flowers.” -> She says she wants to get
some flowers.
2. Reported questions
“Do you like action movies?” -> He asked me if I liked
action movies.
- we keep the rules for tense change
- when we report a question we use the order of the words
from a statement
“What time does the train leave?” -> He asked me what time
the train left.
- we don’t use the aux verbs
- when we report yes/no questions we put IF/WHETHER
after the verb
Homework - pag 173 - 175

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