English Grammar Point Language Transfer Issue Sample Transfer Error Language Background Cause of Difficulty VERBS Present tense Omits -s in present tense, third person singular agreement He like hamburgers. (He likes hamburgers.) Mandarin, Vietnamese Subject-verb agreement is not used in Mandarin or Vietnamese. Past tense Omits tense markers Past perfect formed with be I wait for my teacher after school. (I waited for my teacher after school.) They were arrived. They had arrived. Mandarin, Vietnamese Arabic Mandarin and Vietnamese do not use inflectional endings to change verb tense. In Arabic, past perfect uses this construction. Future tense Incorrectly uses the present tense for the future tense I go next month. (I will go next month.) Mandarin In Mandarin, verb does not change to show tense; tense is indicated by context. Past continuous Uses the past continuous tense for recurring action in the past When I was young, I was playing a lot. (When I was young, I used to play a lot.) Spanish, Tagalog In Spanish, the past continuous tense is used, but in English the expression used to or the simple past tense is used. GRAMMAR TRANSFER CHARTS Tli
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