Recognition

Contents

1) Regnition
2) Vocabulary Box
3) Grammar Spot: Used to

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TODAY’S JOKE
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Recognition

Paul saw someone in the street he recognized as his friend Woodall.

“Woodall,” he said, “what happened to you? You used to be fat and now you’re thin. You used to have hair and now you’re bald. You used to have perfect eyesight and now you wear glasses.”

The man looked at him in astonishment.

“Listen, sir, my name is not Woodall. It’s Wain.”

“Oh!” Paul exclaimed. “You’ve changed your name too!”

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VOCABULARY BOX
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Let’s have a closer look at the words that you might find difficult to understand!

– The meaning of bald is with little or no hair.

– Astonishment means a very great surprise.

– When someone has a perfect eyesight, he/she can see very well.

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GRAMMAR SPOT
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Used to

Today we are going to learn about the form and the use of the verb ‘used to’. This verb has only a past form. Don’t forget, a repeated action in the present is expressed by the Simple Present tense.

Affirmative

I used to
You used to
He/she/it used to
We used to
You used to
They used to

Negative

I did not use to
You did not use to
He/she/it did not use to
We did not use to
You did not use to
They did not use to

Interrogative

Did I use to?
Did you use to?
Did he/she/it use to?
Did we use to?
Did you use to?
Did they use to?

We use ‘used to’ to talk about habitual or regular actions in the past which no longer happen now.

She used to live in Paris, but she moved to Orleans last year.
I used to smoke a packet a day but I stopped two years ago.
I didn’t use to like action films, but I do now.
Did you use to play football when you were at school?

‘Used to’ expresses past states which are no longer true.

There used to be a little cottage here.
She used to have really long hair but she’s had it all cut off.
Helen didn’t use to be afraid of the dark.
I didn’t use to like opera, but now I do.

‘Would’ is sometimes used as a variant of ‘used to’ to express a repeated action in the past. ‘Would’ is more common in written language.

The old woman would go every day to the lake to feed the swans.
When he was at university, he would sleep until noon at the weekends.
The Browns would spend their holidays on the seaside.
She would always come late to the meetings.

But there is a difference between ‘would’ and ‘used to’:

– ‘would’ expresses actions or situations that were repeated many times, but never a past state.

– ‘used to’ expresses actions or situations that continued for a period of time in the past (including repeated actions or situations) and past states.

To make this clearer, let’s take some ‘used to’ sentences and try to change them into ‘would’ sentences.

They used to live in Vienna, but now they have a flat in Salzburg.

Can we use ‘would’ instead of ‘used to’ here?
No, we can’t, because ‘living in Vienna’ wasn’t repeated again and again. Therefore, only ‘used to’ is good in this sentence.

When he was a child he used to play football every Friday.

This is an action that was repeated many times, so we can also say:
When he was a child he would play football every day.

I used to like action films, but now I don’t.

In this case ‘used to’ expresses a past state, so it cannot be replaced by ‘would’.

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That was all for today. I hope you have enjoyed yourself and learnt
new useful things. Till next time, take care.

Your tutor,
Ana
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