Hi all,
Going through a pile of essays, and constantly running into sentences like these:
"Then finally, Max can kill the 3 witches." (instead of "killed")
"I think it was a good movie because it can tell us about something good..." (instead of "told us")
"...but the three witches could take the book back and caught Danni." (instead of "took the book")
"The witches were frightened and Max, his sister and his girlfriend can escape from them." (instead of "escaped")
It doesn't seem to be standard overuse of the present tense - substituting "can" for "could" or "was/were able to." I'm guessing it's Khmer grammar interference, but I don't know this (useage of "bann?") to be able to map out and explain how our languages use these words differently.
Have any of you had success getting your students to stop overusing "can?" Or would someone with more knowledge of Khmer grammar explain what's going on so I can try to develop a strategy?
Thanks.
strategies for suppressing the overuse of "can?"
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Not anEnglish teacher, but it seems it's from not knowing or not wanting to use the past tense of the verbs. They know using the present tense is wrong, so they are trying to come up with other phrasings.
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- vladimir
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I disagree, gavinmac, I see frequent misuse of tenses, especially the past simple and present, even at intermediate level.
Weird.
Whip them.
Make them write 'can' out 1000 times.
Then get nasty...
Weird.
Whip them.
Make them write 'can' out 1000 times.
Then get nasty...
ירי ילדים והפצצת אזרחים דורש אומץ, כמו גם הטרדה מינית של עובדי ההוראה.
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delete - Joon's cracked it
Last edited by andyinasia on Wed Nov 12, 2014 10:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I came, I argued, I'm out
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- Making Khmer girls cry since 2003
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I know a waitress who speaks decent waitress-type English but sometimes drops the phrase "cannot be do."
Follow my lame Twitter feed: @gavin_mac
In Khmer, past tense is expressed by using "bann" which translates into "can" in English.
For instance "khnyom ban tfer haeuy (I already did it)" which is word by word I + can + do + already.
For instance "khnyom ban tfer haeuy (I already did it)" which is word by word I + can + do + already.
SexyJoon wrote:In Khmer, past tense is expressed by using "bann" which translates into "can" in English.
For instance "khnyom ban tfer haeuy (I already did it)" which is word by word I + can + do + already.
K440 : Lucky cheese for the gentry; poultry and death for the peasants.
"Reading made Don Quixote a gentleman. Believing what he read made him mad."
"Reading made Don Quixote a gentleman. Believing what he read made him mad."
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In 13 years here, I've never come across the misuse of can like this.
I suspect something was mis-taught / not corrected by the previous teacher.
I suspect something was mis-taught / not corrected by the previous teacher.
ירי ילדים והפצצת אזרחים דורש אומץ, כמו גם הטרדה מינית של עובדי ההוראה.