REPORTED SPEECH in English Use it correctly Indirect Speech Reported Speech Direct Speech
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- Hello, lovely students.
And welcome back to English With Lucy.
Today, we are going to
talk about reported speech.
Reported speech can seem
really complicated at first,
but my goal in this lesson
is to make it really easy
and understandable for you
so that you can use it with confidence.
To assist you, I’ve
also created a free PDF
that goes with this lesson.
It covers everything we’re
going to discuss today,
and it has a quiz.
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and put what you’ve learned into practise.
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All right, let’s get
started with the lesson.
Firstly, let’s take a
look at direct speech.
The speech is, I like chocolate.
Then we have to follow a
couple of simple rules.
Number one, we have to
add a reporting verb.
Number two, and this
one’s really important.
We have to backshift our tenses by one.
And number three, we have
to change the pronouns.
This sounds very complicated.
Let’s put it into practise.
It’s easier to see it.
If we want to change that
into reported speech,
she said that she liked chocolate.
We’ve added the reporting verb, she said,
we’ve back shifted our tense, like, liked
and we’ve changed the
pronouns, I has gone to she.
The most common reporting
verbs are to say and to tell,
which are conjugated to said and told.
Remember to always include
your reporting verbs
when using reported speech.
A couple more examples.
She said that she loved the movie.
That here is optional.
She said she loved the movie.
She said that she loved the movie.
You can use whichever you’d like.
They said they ate breakfast.
They said that they ate breakfast.
We can also use the
structure to say to someone,
Robert said to his teacher that
he finished the assignment.
Robert said to his teacher
that he had finished the assignment
or Alison said to her mother
that she was feeling ill.
When we use tell, we must
always remember to add in
the person we’re reporting to.
We use the structure tell
plus who we’re reporting to.
She told me that she loved the movie.
They told us that they
had eaten breakfast.
So let’s talk about that
backshift in tenses.
When we use reported speech,
we’re changing the perspective.
English has 12 basic tenses
that can be broken down
into three groups, the past,
the present and the future.
It might sound like a lot of changes,
but I’ve created a list for you.
You can download the PDF
and keep that list with you.
I’ve also got it on screen now.
Focus now on the past perfect
and the past perfect continuous.
You will see that there are no changes.
This is because we can’t really go
any further back in the past.
I had been doing my homework.
Lucy said that she had
been doing her homework,
no change to the tense.
The future tenses are also really easy.
They all use will, and they
simply changes to would.
I will be going to university next year.
Lucy said that she would be
going to university next year.
I think those six tenses are
a gift from the grammar gods.
(laughs)
You just have to focus on the first six.
I’m going to give you some
examples in direct speech
and I want you to change
them into reported speech.
I’m going to give you a few seconds,
but feel free to pause the video.
And let’s look at the present
simple to past simple.
For all of these, I’m going to say I,
and you have to change
it to Lucy said that she.
So the first one, I want to buy a car.
You need to start it
with Lucy said that she.
I’ll give you a few seconds.
Lucy said that she wanted to buy a car,
present simple to past simple.
Let’s try it present
continuous to past continuous.
I am doing my homework.
I’ll give you a couple of seconds.
Lucy said that she was doing her homework.
What about present
perfect to past perfect?
I have finished my homework.
Lucy said that she had
finished her homework,
past simple to past perfect.
I washed the dishes.
Lucy said that she had washed the dished.
Those are the hard ones.
Let’s try a couple with will and would.
I will call you later.
Lucy said that she would call you later.
Now as always with English,
there are some exceptions.
With reported speech, we
usually don’t change the tense
if the information is current
and ongoing, like a habit.
I love my parents.
Lucy said that she loves her parents.
I still love my parents is ongoing.
So we might keep it in the present tense.
Right, that is it for your
introduction to reported speech.
Now it’s time to review
everything you’ve learned
and put it into practise.
I have got some exercises
for you on the PDF.
Just click on the link
in the description box
and sign up to my mailing list.
If you’re interested in taking
my pronunciation course,
you can click on the link
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I teach British English pronunciation,
the modern RP accent, that is my accent.
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I will see you soon for another lesson.
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