1. Wednesday, May 30, 2012 Essay 2 Draft Review & More about *Verbs*
WR090 Skilled Writing through Inquiry: A Community of Scholars Examines Sustainable Food | Sustainable Agriculture
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Essay 2 Draft Review & More about *Verbs*

2. Essay Blueprint Review
Does your paper conform to the directions?
Does the introduction describe a meal from the planning through shopping , meal preparation, serving and sharing the meal?
Does the thesis state whether or not Michael Pollan would approve of the meal?
Do the body paragraphs discuss how the meal measures up to five of Michael Pollan’s rules?
Does the conclusion summarize the paper and reiterate the thesis (in different words, of course)?

3. Verbs—Forming Different Tenses
The verb world is divided into four different principle parts:
The basic form, which we form by naming the infinitive [to be, to go, to study, to wait] and removing the “to.”
We use the basic form to form present , future, and perfect tenses.
The present participle, which we form by adding an –ing to the basic form [being, going, studying, waiting].
The past form, which we form by adding an –ed to the basic form for regular verbs, and we memorize for irregular verbs [was/were (irr), went (irr), studied, waited].
The past participle, which is the same as the past form for regular verbs, and we memorize for irregular verbs [been (irr), gone (irr), studied, waited].

4. Irregular Verbs
Most grammatical errors occur when we are using one of the past tenses of irregular verbs, so it is important to memorize the parts of these verbs that change.
Luckily, patterns apply to the overwhelming majority of irregular verbs. Check these out:
Basic Past Past Participle
go went gone
be was been
eat ate eaten
forget forgot forgotten
run ran run
For a list of common irregular verbs, see

5. Perfect Tenses
Perfect tenses are formed when we add a helping verb to indicate a form of the past tense.
OWL has, arguably, the best reference I have seen ever on what perfect tenses are and how they are best used.
Most of the verb form mistakes people from this region of the country make have to do with the irregular verbs in past perfect tenses. Folks in this part of the world tend to use the past form in place of the past participle when they form the past perfect tense. For regular verbs, the past form is the same as the past participle, so there is no problem with regular verbs, just the irregular ones.
Correct form: I had gone (not I had went)
Correct form: He had run (not he had ran)

6. Tense Overuse
Every region of the country has its own special way of abusing verb forms, and especially the past tenses.
Our special verb tense abuse occurs in the overuse of the past perfect tense.
Most of the time, a simple past tense will do nicely.
For example, instead of saying he had went to the store for more milk (very bad grammar) or he had gone to the store for milk (grammatically correct), most of the time we mean he went to the store for milk.

7. Homework Assigned
Work on Essay 2 and bring your completed essay to class on Tuesday, June 4th
Prepare for a short quiz on the Intro to Food Rules.
Read the handout on verb tense and helping verbs and prepare for a short quiz on Tuesday, June 4th .
In order to prepare for the quiz, complete the exercises distributed in class. If possible, work these problems with others from class. You can check your answers by going to
Bring your questions to class. 