Hello, everyone. You're back with me new at Anglo-link. This is the third video in our learning the tenses series
If you haven't watched the first two videos you may want to go and watch them first
In this third video. I'm going to help you understand the differences between
Present perfect continuous, "I have been doing" and present perfect simple "I have done"
When you're ready we can get started.
Right then
Present perfect continuous and present perfect
Let's look at the formulation of the two tenses
In the previous video we looked at how to formulate present perfect continuous
Let's remind you
I have been playing tennis
So the verb "to be" conjugated
in the present perfect and then the main verb with "ing"
You have been playing tennis
He/she has been playing
We, you and they have been playing
Let's look at present perfect
no continuous
So it's just the verb "have" and the participle:
I have played tennis
Easy
You have played tennis
He/she has played
We, you and they have played
Right let's look at usage
First a reminder: When we use the present perfect continuous,
action that started in the past and is still in progress
For example:
I've been studying all morning
I've been doing the exercises since 11 o'clock
He has been driving for five hours
Let's look at some examples of the present perfect and how they are different from the ones
You've just looked at
So
The present perfect refers to a completed action
An action that's complete at the time of speaking. It's not going on anymore
Look at the first example:
I've studied three sections until now
Let's look at the two sentences together:
So
I've been studying all morning
that means
You started this morning, and you're still studying
Within this time you have completed, you have finished three sections
Now this is present perfect:
I've studied three sections until now
Next example
I've already done half of the exercises
Let's look at the present perfect continuous:
I've been doing the exercises since 11:00
So you started at 11:00, and you are still doing the exercises
But within this time you have already finished half of them
Present perfect:
I've already done half of the exercises
And the last example:
He has driven 500 kilometers so far
Look at the continuous form:
He has been driving for five hours
He is still driving
Within this time he has completed 500 kilometers of driving
By the way, so far is a synonym for until now
Let's look at the timelines now to make it perfectly clear for you
What the difference is between the two tenses are
Right
Here is the timeline for present perfect continuos
An action that started in the past
Has been going on until now
It's still going on
and will go on for a while
Remember that you can refer to this tense with these two words since and for
Since indicates the exact time that the action started in the past
And for tells us how long the action has been going on
Let's have a look at the timeline for the present perfect, and you will see that it will look very very different
Here's an action that happened in the past
It's a completed action at some point in the past
we don't know exactly when or we don't want to say exactly when
What's important is that the action is complete
now at the time of speaking
Right then
Let's look at some common mistakes
You may say or hear I have waited for half an hour
Because you're still waiting
The action is still going on. You should use the present perfect continuous
I have been waiting for half an hour
The action is not complete yet
Let's look at another example:
You may hear or say he has slept since 9 o'clock
Once again because the action is going on, is still in progress. He is still sleeping
We should be using the present perfect continuous
He has been sleeping since nine o'clock
Sometimes you may make the reverse mistake
For example you may hear or say:
Has been snowing twice this week
Now the word twice
means two times
Indicates two finished completed actions
It snowed once, stopped. Is snowed again and stopped
It's not snowing at the moment
Therefore we need to use the present perfect
It has snowed twice this week
One last example to make sure you really got the difference between these two
You may say:
She has been writing many books
It's okay to say she has been writing for many years. She is a writer
But to say the number of books she has already written
referring to completed books
You need to use the present perfect
She has written many books
Right
That's it for our third video
I hope you have found it useful as you know you can now go to our website anglo-link.com
To read the explanations and do the exercises that will help you review this point
Thank you very much for watching and I'll see you in the next video. Bye now