Present Perfect activities

May 27, 2024Jun 04, 2024

Ewa

Justa

Olia

LESSON OVERVIEW

The main objectives of this lesson with Present Perfect activities are to:

• practise Present Perfect in affirmative and negative statements and questions;
• apply the tense to tell the news, talk about experiences and tell stories;
• differentiate the use of Present Perfect and Past Simple.

This lesson contains standalone activities where students can create sentences using Present Perfect with already, just and yet. They associate descriptions with pieces of news using the tense, ask and answer questions to talk about experiences as well as talking about life stories using Present Perfect and Past Simple appropriately. Students also create funny questions using pictures and detect truth or lies in classmates’ statements.

PRESENT PERFECT (JUST, ALREADY, YET)

In this part of the lesson, there are two tasks where students practise already, just and yet with Present Perfect. In ex. 1, they complete sentences using Present Perfect and already, just or yet (e.g. ‘I wrote an email to my boss yesterday, but I haven’t sent it yet’). In ex. 2, students look at the photos and say things that have happened and things that haven’t happened yet (e.g. a picture of friends having lunch together: They’ve already ordered their food. They haven’t posted the picture on social media yet.)

PRESENT PERFECT (NEWS AND EXPERIENCES)

In this section, three tasks help students discuss personal experiences and events using Present Perfect. In ex. 3, students read details and say which piece of news they are about (e.g. We’ve worked really hard, and it has finally happened. Now, we can get a pet, have parties and grow our own food in the garden – My partner and I have bought a house!). Then, they read the details of another situation and guess the news using Present Perfect.

After that, students give some details about the news they receive for their partner to guess the news. In ex. 4, students receive cards with situations (e.g. I have never baked a cake) and, in pairs, they take turns reading statements on the cards and doing tasks (create two sentences connected with the situation, ask their partner a question about the topic). In ex. 5, students match pairs of sentences about life events in the Present Perfect and Past Simple tenses. They also choose two pairs to create more sentences about each situation.

PRESENT PERFECT VS PAST SIMPLE

In this part of the lesson, students do four Present Perfect activities which help them practise Present Perfect and differentiate it from Past Simple. In ex. 6, students receive information about themselves and their partner. They ask their partner questions to complete their information (e.g. has studied English for _____ years; has lived in Brazil since _____; etc.). In ex. 7, they receive a set of cards, choose one and create a funny question using the picture it shows (e.g. a cactus, a clown, an alien, etc.) and the structure Have you ever…? (e.g. Have you ever sat on a cactus?). Their partner imagines that the situation has really happened and continues the story in Past Simple with their ideas.

In ex. 8, students look at different topics (e.g. work, traveling, sport, etc.) and share something they haven’t done but think their partner has. If their partner has done it, they share three details about their experience. In ex. 9, students choose one activity (e.g. meet a celebrity, miss a flight, see the ocean, etc.) and say they have done it. Other students ask questions about the experience to figure out if it is true. 

WORKSHEETS

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