Interlanguage: Activity 1
Variety in verb tense/aspect
Please read the information about interlanguage before working through these activities.
Interlanguage anlysis seeks to identify patterns (some call these ‘rules’) in learners’ language, to better understand what learners do and do not know (Interlanguage Overview). Those patterns include both errors and correct production of linguistic features such as tense, aspect, article use, pronouns, gender agreement. For example, in the beginning a learner may just use masculine gender for all nouns; some will look like errors and some will look ‘correct’. The IL pattern is, all nouns are masculine, so in a way, none of the gender marking is native-like.
Take a look at the verb tense and aspect combinations used by both Henry and Raúl in the interview task. Then use the table below to check off which are used by each learner, and indicate the line numbers. The first is completed for you as an example. Then answer the question below the table. NOTE: In some cases, a speaker attempts a verb tense but uses it incorrectly. For example, in line 24 Henry says ‘ella fue de Puerto Rico’; this is the third person preterite form, but Henry should have used the third person imperfect ‘era’. List ‘fue’ as a preterite form in the table, but with an asterisk because it is inaccurate: *fue.
| Henry (line #) | Raúl (line #) | |
| Simple Present (e.g. ella hace) |
9: Mi primera lengua es inglés | |
| Present Progressive (e.g. estoy haciendo) |
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| Imperfect (e.g. ella hacía) |
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| Conditional (e.g. ella haría) |
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| Preterite (e.g. Diego hizo) |
24: Ella *fué de Puerto Rico | |
| Present Perfect (e.g. ha hecho) |
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| Past Perfect (e.g. había hecho) |
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| Past Progressive (e.g. estaba haciendo) |
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| Past Perfect Progressive (e.g. había estado haciendo) |
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| Present Subjunctive (e.g. Espero que haga) |
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| Imperfect Subjunctive (e.g. Si hiciera … ) |
What patterns do you see in the verb tense/aspect marking done by Henry and Raúl? Is there more variety of verb tense/aspect marking on the part of one or the other learner? Explain.
When you have finished typing your answer, click to compare your response with the Learner Language staff response.
