Learn Present Perfect Tense in 8 minutes - English Grammar Lessons

Hey, it’s Kate, your English teacher. Welcome to my channel.

Today we gonna learn how to use the Present Perfect in English.

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Now let’s talk about the situations When we use the Present Perfect.

so you can feel more confident using this grammar tense

And even if you think that you know well how and when to use it

This lesson will help you refresh your memory. Let’s get started

The Present Perfect Tense is one of the most confusing grammar tenses

Because many students don’t have the same tense in their native language.

In Russian, for example, it's a great problem to understand English perfect tenses

Because we don't have the difference between "I did" and “I have done”.

so English Perfect Tenses drive us crazy And it’s tricky to figure out why we use

the Present Perfect Tense to talk about the PAST.

So We use this tense to talk about events that happened in the past,

but we don’t know when and the time doesn’t matter.

And, there is one important thing about the Present Perfect

- we use it when we talking about Past actions that are relevant to the present.

But before we move on to the basic uses of the Present Perfect

Let’s focus on How we form this tense.

The Present Perfect is formed with the verb have or has (which depends on the

subject) I have

You have He, she, it has

We have They have

And the main verb – the past participle.

To form the past participle of regular verbs We add “-ed” to the base form of the verb:

Work-worked-worked Play-played-played

But in English there are a lot of irregular verbs.

Those verbs do not follow any rules. English learners find them hard to memorize.

I think we all learned many irregular verbs at school.

Catch - caught – caught Build - built - built

So to form the Present Perfect tense we use The subject+ Have or has+ the past participle.

Let’s look at the examples. I have played a new video game.

He has built a new house. The negative:

I have not played a new video game. He has not built a new house.

And the question form - Have I played a new video game?

Has he built a new house?

Now we gonna focus on the situations When we use the Present Perfect Tense.

First of all, we use the Pr Perfect to talk about something

that started in the past and go on to the present

Something that has a connection with the present. I’ve studied English for five years.

I began to study English five years ago and I’m still studying.

I’ve worked for the company since 2009. That meant it started in 2009 and it is true

today. For and since are keywords.

They show us that we need to use the Present Perfect form.

The second situation. We use the Present perfect to talk about

past actions that have been completed recently. We use this tense with adverbs of time just and already

I have just seen a rainbow. Just means that something happened some time

ago. Maybe some minutes or some hours ago.

Something that has happened recently.

I’ve done my homework already. That means I‘ve completed my homework.

It happened in the past and we don’t know when, but it already happened.

Now let’s move on to another situation when we use the Present Perfect.

We use the Pre Perfect to talk about finished actions that have a result in the present.

I’ve lost my watch. The action happened in the past and it’s

finished. But it has a result in the present.

I’ve lost my watch – right now I still don’t have my watch, it’s lost.

That is the result.

The next situation. We use the Present Perfect when we are

talking about our experience up to the present:

I’ve studied in Spain. I've seen that movie before.

We don't say when exactly the experience happened, but it is finished now.

By the way, talking about your experience,You might say something like: I haven’t become fluent in English yet.

If you’re watching this video now, you’re probably not.

And I recommend you to watch my video about fluency.

This video is about the main practical steps to become fluent in English and how you can

work to improve your language skills. I’ll leave a link to this video in the description

box below so you can watch it after this lesson.

Now let’s move on to the next case. We use the Present perfect to talk about

places we have visited and returned.

I have been to the United States (I have been

in my life, but now I’m in my home country) She's been to Antalya twice.

She has been, and she's returned home.

The next situation. We use The present Perfect when we are talking about an action with a result

in the present to mean that the person went to the place and is at the place now.

Where's Mary? She's gone to the market (she's at the market now).

My brother has gone to Brazil (now he's in Brazil). They've gone to New Delhi for three weeks.

Now they're in New Delhi.

There is one important thing you should remember. When you speak to your friends you can feel

free to use contractions. I’ve been to London.

I’ve watched this movie. But

Please Never write contracted forms of the present

perfect in Academic English or Business English. Use the full forms

Instead of contracted forms.

When students write Academic tests it is required to use formal language.

So you should use full forms of Perfect Tenses. As I said before, we use the Present Perfect

when we talk about something that happens in the past and we don’t know

the exact time when it happened. So if you want to use the words : Ago,

Yesterday, Last week,

Last year, In 2017.

Those words indicate that you don’t need to use the Present Perfect.

You should use the Past Simple instead. And the words you should definitely use for

the Present Perfect: For, Just, Yet,

Ever, Since, Never, Already.

Well that’,s it for today’s lesson. Please post your comments down below using

the Present Perfect. Feel free to ask me any questions.

Share this video with your friends. And don’t forget to subscribe to English

lessons with Kate. Thank you so much for your comments.

For your support. Thank you for learning English with me. And I'll see

you next week. Bye-bye.