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hi everybody my name is alicia in this
lesson we're going to talk about some
expressions you can use to talk about
your abilities so i'm going to introduce
some expressions you can use for the
past for the present and for the future
these are just a few examples of some
ways you can talk about the things you
can could and will be able to do so
let's take a look with a few examples of
each pattern okay let's start with the
first one i can plus a verb so here the
subject in the sample pattern is i but
we can replace i with for example he or
she or it or they the same is true for
all of the other patterns i'm going to
introduce in this lesson
so we use i can plus a verb as sort of
the basic uh most simple way to express
something we are able to do so example
sentences
i can speak english my verb here is
speak in this case so
this could be something many of you can
use
another example here i've changed the
subject to she she so she can my verb is
run she can run
5k
meaning 5 kilometers
in 30 minutes so these are just some
simple very basic ways to express
something we can do we are able to do of
course we can use the negative for this
i can't speak english i can't speak
chinese for example or she can't run 5k
in 30 minutes we can make the negative
with this pattern too so this is maybe
the most basic way to express something
you can do you are able to do
let's look at another one
this expression is i know how to plus a
verb i know how to do something so we
can use uh the same verbs we used in the
first pattern
in this pattern if you like for example
i know how to speak english is fine
however
we use know how to do something for
something that requires like study or
something that requires maybe a process
there are rules for that thing
so
a sentence like i know how to run 5k
it's not quite so natural because
running isn't really necessarily a topic
of study running requires practice yes
but it's not really something we study
so we use know how to do something for
something we have learned how to do so
not necessarily physical practice of
something but we have learned this thing
so some examples i know how to use
photoshop so photoshop is a piece of
software
something we can study something we
learn how to use
another example he knows how to bake
cookies so here this is something we
need to study in other words so there's
a process
to baking cookies he knows how to bake
cookies so please keep in mind as we see
in this example when we change the
subject from i to for example he she or
it
the following verb no needs to change we
need to modify the verb so it has an s
at the end he knows how to bake cookie
so don't forget this s however this verb
does not change he knows
how to
bake
cookies so we don't need to modify this
verb we'll only modify the first one
which is attached to he the subject okay
so this is for a process something we
study to become able to do
now let's talk about a couple of past
tense examples so these two uh are maybe
present tense expressions
let's talk about some past tense example
sentences the first one when i was a kid
i could and our verb so here i've said
when i was a kid you can change this of
course when i was a student when i was
an elementary school student
when i lived in a different city for
example so this part can change to a
different time period in your life
however here i'm using the past tense
could i could so this implies this
suggests
that maybe this action is not possible
for you now let's look at some examples
so when i was a kid
i could swim all day long so this
sentence sounds like now i can't really
it's it's just a simple expression with
past tense i could i could um so maybe
the speaker is going to share some more
information about their current
abilities
but here i've used when i was a kid
again you can change this to like when i
was uh in swimming club for example i
could swim all day long so there are a
lot of different variations you can use
with this pattern anyway let's look at
another example
when you were a kid so maybe if a parent
wants to talk to their son or daughter
about their childhood they can use this
expression so when you were a kid
you could sleep for 12 hours straight so
it's 12 hours straight means 12 hours
non-stop
so
you
is my subject here when you therefore
was in my example pattern changes to
were when you were a kid you could sleep
for 12 hours straight
so again this is a past tense expression
let's look at one more past tense
expression maybe you're familiar with
used to used to so i used to
be able to
do something so where the action is a
verb here
so here we have used to
so maybe you know i used to followed by
just a simple verb so like i used to
cook every day or i used to exercise
every day
here
we introduce i used to be able to
this expression allows us to explain an
ability we had in the past so let's look
at some examples
i used to be able to speak spanish
here's my verb to speak spanish
used to shows a long time ago in the
past i had this ability but now i do not
so remember the nuance of used to
is that something was true in the past
and it is not true now i used to also
please consider the pronunciation here
so not used to but native speakers
connect the d and the t sound at the end
of used and to so it's not used to but
used to used to there's just one sound
there used to so think of it as dropping
the d used to i used to do something
one more example
she used to be able to babysit meaning
her schedule maybe has changed
now she cannot babysit so here we have
some expressions with used to to talk
about a past ability okay finally let's
end with one example a pattern that you
can use to talk about future
possibilities or future abilities
so you can use this when you want to
make a guess about the future so
something you think you might be able to
do in the future
so
the base pattern is in the future
we'll be able to verb so here i have we
in my example we will so wheel is the
contracted form of we will and i've used
we in this case we means all people all
people all members of society we
together so some examples of this in the
future we'll be able to use ai
technology ai so artificial intelligence
ai technology in the future we'll be
able to use ai technology
so
you might wonder why am i using will
here instead of like going to for
example we use will when we're making a
guess about the future that we can't
really see so we can't see what's going
to happen in the future and maybe we
don't have such a strong level of
confidence we don't have a super high
level of confidence about our guests in
those cases we can use will so these are
nice to talk about capabilities things
we are able to do or in this case things
we might be able to do in the future
so this is a sentence you can use to
make a prediction to make a guess let's
look at one more example sentence okay
in the future we'll be able to travel to
space so here again i'm making a guess
about space travel so i don't have a
high level of confidence because i don't
know very much about space travel but i
want to make a guess in the future we'll
be able to travel to space if you want
to decrease the level of confidence of
your guests you can include i think for
example in the future i think we'll be
able to travel to space so you can
change the level of your confidence of
your guess
by introducing some other phrases like i
think or maybe
all right so these are a few ways that
you can express your abilities in the
past the present and in the future these
are just a couple of different patterns
to do that but please be careful some
things that i've noticed are that
often students will mix up the present
tense can and past tense could
so make sure to use past tense when
you're talking about your abilities in
the past
and make sure to use present tense for
the things you are able to do now so
please keep that in mind okay so that's
all for this lesson i hope that it was
helpful for you if you have any
questions or if you want to try making a
sentence with one of these expressions
please feel free to do so in the comment
section below this video if you like the
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study resources thanks very much for
watching this lesson and i will see you
again soon bye
[Music]
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