What's the Dif? (Vol. 2): Like to do or Like doing

Gerunds* and infinitives** and how to use them may be one of the most confusing and frustrating parts of English for non-native speakers. (My students HATE the gerunds and infinitives quizzes I give them, which is why I give them so often.) More and more, even native speakers are making mistakes, but not for the same reason. (Non-native speakers have to work really hard to learn English well enough to make these mistakes. Non-native speakers have to be extra lazy to make them.)

The most common place to find gerunds and infinitives in English is in the object position, after the main verb. For example:

• I enjoy reading historical novels.
• We plan to go snorkeling next weekend.
• I promised to buy a bigger diamond for my wife on our fifth anniversary.
• Doctors recommend sleeping at least seven hours a night.

With each of these main verbs, you have no choice. Enjoy and recommend must be followed by a gerund. Plan and promise must be followed by an infinitive***.

There is another group of verbs that can be followed by either the gerund or the infinitive form of the verb. For example:

• It started to rain an hour ago. / It started raining an hour ago.
• I will continue to study Spanish next year / I will continue studying Spanish next year.
• Japanese people prefer to take baths at night. / Americans prefer taking showers in the morning.

In all of these examples, either sentence is ok and both sentences have the same meaning. However, sometimes either the gerund or the infinitive is better depending on the grammatical structure of the rest of the sentence. For example:

• It is starting to rain.
• It is starting raining.

To me, the first choice is ok but the second choice is bad because the gerund-gerund construction sounds weird. In the sentence The children are practicing writing in cursive, the gerund-gerund construction is unavoidable (sort of) because practice can only be followed by a gerund and you must use practicing because it is the continuous tense. However, with starting, you have a choice, so don't put two gerunds together. (I would eliminate writing to avoid the weird construction. The children are practicing cursive.) Here is another example of a weird structure you should try to avoid if possible.

• It is going to start to rain in a minute.
• It is going to start raining in a minute.

In this case, the sentence with to rain is a poor choice because the main verb, start, is also following to. (However, to start is not an infinitive. Is going to is a helping verb that is basically the same as will.) The second choice, to start raining, is much better. A good general rule of thumb is "avoid repetition whenever possible." (Unless, of course, there's a good reason to be repetitive. Ain't English fun?)

There is a small group of verbs that can be followed by either a gerund or an infinitive, but the meaning changes depending on which you use. This is the main point of the blog. (Finally, huh?) I will explain each one in more detail.

Like to do or Like doing?

In reality, the difference between the two is small enough that I generally say "Don't worry about it." You can use either form and nobody would really care. However, if you really want to be accurate, here's the difference.

• I really like to swim in the ocean.
• I really like swimming in the ocean.

In this case, the second choice, swimming, is the better choice because in this situation, like means enjoy. The chance to swim in the ocean is something I get excited about. Since enjoy must be followed by a gerund, it is better to use the gerund form when you are talking about a fun activity. On the other hand:

• Most Americans like to take a shower in the morning.
• Most Americans like taking a shower in the morning.

In this situation, the first choice, to take, is better because like means prefer. I don't jump up and down in anticipation of my morning shower. I don't go to bed dreaming about it. However, if you give me a choice, taking a shower in the morning is preferred. I just don't feel right if I don't.

If you were in my class taking a test, I wouldn't care either way. I don't think about this when I write or speak. In the immortal words of Gus Portokalos in My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding, "There you go." The next pairs, on the other hand, you do need to pay attention to.

Remember/Forget to do or Remember/Forget doing?

One of these means I'm going to get into trouble. The other means I have had a great experience.

• I forgot to do my homework.
• I will never forget watching the sun rise from the top of Mt. Fuji.

If there was something important you were supposed to do, but it slipped your mind, you forgot to do it. When my wife reminds me to go to the store, she will say "Don't forget to buy diapers for Skyler." When I get home, she will ask me "Did you remember to call your mother on her birthday?" The infinitive is usually used in everyday situations. Forgot to do is usually preceded by "Oops."

On the other hand, I've been very lucky to have had many wonderful experiences in my life. For example:

• I remember riding an elephant through the hill country of northern Thailand.
• I will never forget shaking Jimmy Carter's hand or meeting my wife for the first time.

The older I get, the more I look back on my life using gerunds.

Try to do or Try doing?

If I want to get ahead on my homework by finishing my research paper a week early, I would say:

• I will try to finish my research paper by Monday.

If my friend wants me to call him on Friday evening, but I think I might be out late, I would say to him:

• I will try to call you tonight.

Try to do means you want to do something, but you might not be able to. Try to do means you are not sure you will be able to keep a promise. Tried to do in the past tense is very often misused by non-native speakers. For example, a second-language learner might say:

• I tried to get a part-time job last summer.

What they mean to say is that they did get a part-time job and worked all summer. However, because of the verb tried, what they really say is they failed. They couldn't get a job. What they should say is:

• I got a part-time job last summer.

Short, sweet and factual. On the contrary, if there is something you've always thought about doing, but have never done, you would say:

• I would love to try skydiving.

Or if you did something for the first time on a really fun trip, you could say:

• I tried snowboarding for the first time in New Zealand.

Try doing is used for experiments, for something you are doing for the first time. If you are cooking a difficult dish for the first time, you will try making it. If you want to exercise your brain, you should try learning a foreign language. Success or failure depends on a gerund or an infinitive.

Stop to do or Stop doing?

The following sentences describe something I would say to my students during a test, something I did because I got old and something my mother said to me quite often when I was young.

• Stop talking!
• I stopped playing rugby.
• Stop hitting your brother!

When an activity is finished, you stop doing it. The following sentences describe what happened while I was driving to the North Shore, something that happened while I was writing this blog and something my father had to do frequently while we were driving from Pennsylvania to Texas. (Good Lord, those were long trips.)

• I stopped to admire the gigantic waves.
• I stopped to change a stinky diaper.
• He stopped to yell at my brother and me because we were fighting.

Stop to do explains why you interrupted what you were doing in the first place. Why did you stop?

Regret to do or Regret doing?

Everyone has done stupid things that they wish they hadn't done. Unfortunately, I have probably done more stupid things than most people. For example:

• I regret not asking Denise Brown out when I was in tenth grade. (Man, I was an idiot.)
• I regret spending so much money in Roppongi on weekends.
• I regret buying a laser disk player.

I just hope my wife never regrets marrying me. Regret to do is much less common and is usually used with the verbs inform or tell. It is used when you have to tell someone bad news.

• I regret to inform you that your credit card was declined.
• I regret to tell you that you will have to repeat this course in summer school.

Just like hitting a backhand or making a free-throw, it will take some practice and some concentration, and you will fail sometimes, but over time, you will fail less and less and you will learn to use these patterns correctly.

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*To make a gerund you add ~ing to the base form of a main verb. Sometimes you need to double the last consonant (CVC), and sometimes you need to drop the final "e".

• fishing / jumping / thinking
• running / getting / planning
• taking / smiling / biting

**To make an infinitive you simply put to in front of the base form of the verb.

• to fish / to run / to smile

***I have put together a list of what I think are the most common and most useful verbs that are followed by either a gerund or infinitive with notes about usage and meaning. If you would like a copy, email me with the message "Can I have the gerunds and infinitives list?" and I will send you an attached copy. (If anybody knows how to attach a PDF file to either this blog or Facebook, please let me know.)

Chunky Language (It's Delicious with Milk)

Grammar is all about connections. What words go with what other words? Where does one phrase end and the next begin? How can you have does is in the middle of a sentence? It's all about the chunks.

As far as I know, I invented the term Chunky Language. This refers to the natural grouping of words into phrases and clauses in English. A chunk is any group of two or more words that naturally go together. Every chunk has an anchor word, meaning the main word in the chunk. For example, a warm sunny day is one chunk anchored on the noun day. This particular chunk would be called a noun phrase.

Another simple example is We went to the beach. The second chunk is anchored on the first word to, which is a preposition, so this kind of chunk would be called a prepositional phrase. The first chunk, on the other hand, is anchored by the word went. Since this is the main verb and we is the subject of went, then this chunk is a clause. A slightly weird chunk would be something like three weeks ago. The anchor word, ago, is an adverb*, which might seem a little unusual, although it is common.

What's the difference between a clause and a phrase? The answer is quite simple. A clause has a subject and a main verb, a phrase does not. For example, the sentence I left my book in my locker has two chunks. The first chunk is a clause because it has a subject (I) and a verb (left). The object (book) is also a part of the chunk. The second chunk is a prepositional phrase.

The basic chunks are pretty easy to figure out. For example, read the following sentence out-loud with a clear pause between the first and second chunks.

• I took my dog for a walk in the park.

It is obvious that this sounds extremely weird and that the following would be the correct way to chunk up** the sentence.

• I took my dog for a walk in the park.

This is a nice, neat sentence with three chunks: one SVO clause and two prepositional phrases. Students rarely mis-chunk a sentence like this. (I love inventing new words.) The biggest problem students seem to have is knowing when one chunk stops and the next begins. Their chunks are too long and they consistently run through the STOP SIGNS.

What are the STOP SIGNS for chunks in English? Basically there are five: commas, conjunctions, prepositions, postpositions*** and connecting pronouns.

Commas: Commas are easy to identify and the majority of commas are stop signs. Most commas divide information. For example:

• Yesterday, it rained all day.
• On Wednesdays, school finishes at 2:15.
• Barack Obama, who became the 45th President last year, was educated in Hawaii.

The information before or between the commas is separated from the rest of the sentence. Therefore, the chunk stops at the comma. (Don't forget that a chunk must have two or more words, so in the first sentence, yesterday is not a part of any chunk. I'll elaborate more in my next blog entry.)

However, not all commas are stop signs. Sometimes commas can be connectors, specifically in lists. Look at the following examples.

• We took a long, relaxing walk in the park.
• My mother, father, brother and I drove from Pennsylvania to Seattle in a tiny Volkswagen Rabbit.

In these examples, the commas are replacing the conjunction and. The original chunks would be long and relaxing and my mother and my father and my brother and I.

Prepositions: The simple prepositions, like in, on or by, are easy to see. They begin the chunk and the chunk ends with a noun or a pronoun. However, some pronouns are trickier to identify. Chunking up a sentence can help. For example:

• A bunch of fans were shirtless in spite of the freezing temperatures.
• The girl who sits in front of me in math class is really nice.

Look at two specific parts and decide which sounds better when you say it out-loud. Don't forget to exaggerate the pause in the middle.

• in spite of the freezing temperatures / in spite of the freezing temperatures
• in front of me / in front of me

Each one sounds much, much better as one chunk. Therefore, in spite of and in front of are both what I call phrasal prepositions.

Conjunctions: There are two types of conjunctions: coordinating and subordinating. The difference is pretty important, but I'll save that for another blog. For chunks, conjunctions like because, when and as long as are always stop signs that divide two clauses. For example:

• I will call you as soon as I wake up tomorrow morning.
• The Cowboys lost the game even though they didn't give up an offensive touchdown.
• Santa Clause delivered the presents while the children were sleeping.

Notice that the conjunctions as soon as, even though and while are included in the chunk. This will be important later.

Pronouns: Again, there are two kinds of connecting pronouns. The first group is called relative pronouns and they include which, that, who and whom. They connect adjective clauses to nouns. For example:

• My iPad, which I bought in July, has become my most valuable productivity tool.
• Anyone whose first language is English should consider themselves very fortunate.

A new chunk begins with the connecting pronoun. Each sentence actually has only two chunks because the first word(s) are connected the main verbs of the main clauses.

The other kind of connecting pronoun is actually called a noun clause marker, but I still call them pronouns. (See a blog soon to be written on The Grammar Geek Sez about this.) I don't have a name for them yet. If you have a good suggestion, I'm all ears. These are the words that, obviously, connect noun clauses to the rest of the sentence. For example:

• I didn't know that you had lived in Japan for so long.
• She hasn't told me if she has decided what college she is going to attend.

I'm extra proud of the second sentence because it contains two noun clauses.

There are a lot of little tricks and exceptions and things to remember that I will elaborate on in a second installment of Chunky Language. But for now, this is an overview of the first step in your quest to develop Grammar Vision. This can be very subjective and there are usually multiple correct answers depending on whether you think something should be one larger chunk or two smaller chunks, especially with clauses. The best rule I can give you is the Three Bears Rule. A chunk should be neither too long nor too short. It should be just right. (And this rule probably doesn't help you at all. Sorry.)

Practice makes perfect. For second-language learners, this will get easier over time with practice. It is an art, not a science. If you find and interesting sentence, copy it and send it to me via my Facebook group Mr. K's Grammar Page. We'll see what happens.

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*I have seen words like ago referred to as postpositions, which makes sense to me. A PREposition is an anchor word that goes at the beginning of a chunk. A POSTposition is an anchor word that goes at the end of a chunk. Other postpositions would include early (ten minutes early) and adjectives like long (ten feet long) or thick (three millimeters thick).

**Chunk up is another original term that means to divide a sentence into chunks.

How to Learn Grammar Perfectly: One Man's Opinion

Grammar is hard. Grammar is confusing. Grammar is tricky. Grammar is frustrating. Grammar is terrifying. Grammar is a headache. Grammar is a nightmare. Grammar is thought-provoking. Grammar is challenging. Grammar is interesting. Grammar is fun. Grammar is a game. Grammar is a puzzle. Grammar is the core of language. Grammar is the core of culture. Grammar is the core of our identities. Grammar is friggin' AWESOME!

I was like every other kid in elementary school, junior high school and high school who said, "Why do I need to learn grammar? I already know how to speak English!" This is proof that God in whatever form he or she may take has a wicked sense of humor. I was a terrible student in language classes, English or World. I failed Spanish. I failed Latin. I failed Chinese. I ignored grammar. I never studied. I must have been my teachers' worst nightmare. So God made me a language teacher. (It took every ounce of willpower not to explode on a ninth grader I overheard say "Why do I need to study vocabulary? I already know all the English I need to know." Payback is a bitch, ain't it?)

A wise man once said, "All you need to be happy in life is two things: something you love and something you are good at. And if God has truly blessed you, they will be the same thing." Grammar is my blessing.

Somewhere along the line, I really began to understand grammar. I began to see things differently. Things slowly came into focus. A piece of the puzzle came to me every now and then, mostly thanks to my students. Without their constant questions, which pushed the limits of my own understanding, I would never have caught the grammar virus. The more I learned, the more I wanted to learn. Every time I thought I had something figured out, some weirdness of English would pop up and make me question and refine my theories and hypotheses.

But it was also a second blessing from God that made this possible. God didn't just give me a talent and curiosity for languages. God also made me lazy. I hate to do research. I hate to read grammar books. They are dry and boring and I don't understand them. (At least the ones I've read and used in the classroom.) So I just used logic and little bits of research here and there, mostly to confirm my hypotheses. Along the way, I think I have come up with something a little bit different that works, at least for me and some (most?) of my students. I don't claim to have all the answers and I don't claim that everything I say is absolutely correct. I'm fallible. I'm human. I have a lot to learn, but I think I have a lot to teach, too.

I live in Hawaii and I am married to a lovely and beautiful Japanese woman who also happens to be the most talented hula and Tahitian dancer I have ever seen. She has introduced me to the world of Polynesian dance in a way I had never imagined. And this has helped me understand what I have learned to do differently and what has allowed me to figure out grammar and how to teach it.

When my wife and I see Polynesian dancing together, we both intuitively know when we are watching an average, good or great performance. However, while I can only see the dance as a whole and admire the costumes in their entirety, my wife can do so much more. She sees everything I see and appreciates the beauty of the whole. But she can go so much deeper. She sees the precision of the hands. She admires the contrast of well chosen colors for the muu-muu and the lei. She sees the little extra grace in the expert kaholo. I see hula one way, she sees it two ways, each one complementing the other.

To truly understand grammar, you need to develop a second way of looking at language. Of course, the most important thing is to be able to understand and communicate to the best of your ability. But there are times, especially when you read and write, that you need more. Most of the time, when you go to the doctor's office, a general examination is enough to figure out what's going on. However, sometimes the doctor needs to see what's happening on the inside. That's when your doctor's uses an X-ray machine or an MRI. As a language student, you need to develop your own grammatical X-ray vision. When you read something that you just don't quite understand, how do you figure it out? When you write something that just doesn't seem quite right, that is obviously a little awkward, how do you fix it?

You need GRAMMAR VISION.

And there are just three little steps you need to take to get the basics, just three little things you need to learn.

1. Parts of Speech -- Can you identify the correct part of speech of any word in any sentence of any book written in English?
2. Parts of a Clause -- Can you identify the subject, verb, object (both direct and indirect) or the complement of any clause in any sentence in any book written in English?
3. Types of Clauses -- Can you identify a main clause, a noun clause, an adjective clause or an adverb clause?

If you can do this, you can do almost anything. And it's much easier than it sounds. If you make a true effort to learn this, if you truly believe that this is important and truly want to figure it out, you can do it in as little as a month.

This is the first in a series of blog entries I will write detailing my ideas and explaining the basics. If you are a student who is interested in learning or a teacher who is interested in trying this out, I need some more guinea pigs.

Thanks for the Questions (Vol. 2)

A couple of questions were asked recently on Mr. K's Grammar Page on Facebook that require longer answers than FB allows. So welcome to the second installment of Thanks for the Questions.

From Ang Kok Weng: Is it right to say: "It is rare that he left early at work yesterday"?

The short answer is "No, there are a few errors." There are several things going on in this sentence that are working against each other.

1. The word rare is an adjective that answers the question How often? It's more commonly used cousin is the adverb rarely. For these frequency words*, the most common verb tense is the simple present tense. Therefore, It is rare is correct. However, the word yesterday at the end of the sentence doesn't match. (rarely = present / yesterday = past)

To fix this, there are two options. First, as Grammar Girl suggested on her FB page, put the emphasis on leaving early and de-emphasize rare by putting it in an adjective clause. The second option is to contrast the usual and the unusual with but.

2. Most verbs of motion, like come and go, are intransitive** so the are usually followed by a preposition, as in go to or come from. However, leave is often used as a transitive** verb, so no preposition is needed. The correct phrase is left work.

3. The location of the adverb early is also awkward. It is true that adverbs can go in many different places in a sentence, but the one place they CAN'T go is between the verb and its object. That's like separating a mother bear from her cub. Never a good idea. Adverbs of time almost always go first or last.

Put all three of these together and here are my recommendations.

• Yesterday, he left work early, which is rare.
• He rarely leaves work early, but yesterday he left right after lunch.

If you choose the but option, it is necessary to add the specific information of how early?

From Zanna Jay: Which one is correct? "Did he know?" Or "Did he knew?"

"Did he know?" is the only choice. "Did he knew?" can never be correct. This mistake is what I call the Double ~ed. It is the fraternal twin of the Double ~s.

In the simple past tense, you need to add ~ed to regular*** verbs, as in liked and dripped. In the third person singular, when the subject is either she, he or it, you must add ~s to the verb in the simple present tense, as in likes and drips. Simple enough, right?

In a simple present tense question, you need the helping verb do in front of the subject. Therefore, They know... becomes Do they know...? Again, very simple. However, it can be confusing when you combine the two.

Think of the helping verb do as the greedy little kid who never has his own toys, has to collect all of the other toys and won't share them with any of the other kids. Start with these simple sentences.

• He knew the answer.
• He knows the answer.

They are playing happily in the sandbox with their ~s and their ~ed. Then the big bully Do shows up.

• Do he knew the answer?
• Do he knows the answer?

Do sees the ~s and the ~ed and immediately wants them. So do runs over and grabs them away, leaving the correct English grammar.

• Did he know the answer?
• Does he know the answer?

My term Double ~ed or Double ~s refers to when Do brings his own toy and leaves the main verb with theirs.

• XXX Did he knew the answer? (do + ~ed) and (know + ~ed)
• XXX Does he knows the answer? (d0 + ~s) and (know + ~s)

It's just not in Do's nature to share. It just doesn't work. (And, by the way, Do is just as greedy in negative sentences. Never say "I didn't knew..." or "She doesn't knows..."

From Zanna Jay: Which is correct? "She got killed"? Or "She get killed"?

"She got killed" has to be correct for two reasons. First, for the second one, since it is in the simple present tense, you would need to add an ~s, as in "She gets killed." Second, except for cats and vampires, people can only die once. "She gets killed" has the idea that it can happen again and again. (See above for frequency.) Unless you plan to actually kill this person, I assume that you are reporting someone's death, which happened in the past.

For me, an even more interesting question is "What is the difference between She got killed and She was killed?"

She was killed is the passive voice and both of these have the same meaning. It is common in informal English to replace the be verb with get. (You shouldn't do this in formal situations, though.) Look at these simple sentences.

• It is dark
• It suddenly got dark.

The first sentence with is simply describes the current situation. However, the second sentence with got emphasizes the change, from light to dark. Similarly, She was killed states a simple fact, but She got killed adds the idea of the change from alive to dead. Another example would be:

• The room was cleaned.
• The room got cleaned.

I might be the only person interested in this last part, but thank you once again to Ang Kok Wen and Zanna Jay for giving me the opportunity to stretch my grammar a little bit. As they say in Hawaii, A hui ho! (Until we meet again.)

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*Frequency words answer the question How often? They include never, always, occasionally, often, once in a while and frequently. These words usually indicate that the simple present tense should be used.

**A transitive verb is a verb that must have a direct object. An intransitive verb is a verb that cannot have an object. For example:

• I dropped my pencil.
• My pencil fell to the floor.

Drop is a transitive verb because I must explain what I dropped. Fall is an intransitive verb so it is followed by a preposition.

***For an irregular verb, the ~ed form does not actually have ~ed. To me, knew is the ~ed form of know.

What's the Dif? (Vol. 1): Because or Since?

There is a lot of confusion about these two. Which should you use? Which is better? On Grammar Girl's FB group, someone just mentioned that, in law school, she was taught to never use since to mean because. Since should only be used to describe length of time, or how long something has continued. I understand this and it's probably not a bad rule of thumb, especially in the law where nuance can be left open to so much interpretation.

If you want to keep it simple, follow this rule. It's a good one. However, if you want to know the difference, perhaps this will help.

As I mentioned above, since has two uses. The first is to describe length of time. It describes something that began in the past and is still continuing now. When you use since in this way, you must ALWAYS use the simple past tense in the adverb clause with since, and you must ALWAYS the present perfect tense in the main clause. There is no other pattern that I am aware of. For example:

• I have lived in Hawaii since I returned to the US from Japan in 2001.
• Jenny has wanted to be a dancer since she was a very little girl.

The second use of since is in cause and effect sentences and has the same meaning as because. However, there is a fairly significant difference between the two. Which to use depends on what information is most important. What do you want to emphasize? Take the following sentences as an example.

• We decided to come home from the beach early because the children were really tired.
• Since the children were tired, we decided to come home from the beach early.

Both of these sentences have the same meaning, but in the first sentence, the most important information is why we came home early. That's why it is at the end of the sentence. On the other hand, the most important information in the second sentence is the result, or effect, of the children's tiredness, i.e. coming home early.

The simplest way I can explain the difference is this: If the cause (reason) is the more important than the effect (result), the use because and put it in the middle. If the effect (result) is more important than the cause (reason), then use since and put it at the beginning.

A second way to explain this is: Because goes in the middle of the sentence and since goes at the beginning. Never begin a sentence with because and never put since in the middle.

• because = important = in the middle
• since = less important = at the beginning

Or, follow the really simple rule and only use since to explain how long.