Perfect Tense - Unit 01

Perfect Tense

Past Perfect

We use the past perfect when an action is already completed before something in the past.

                    had + past participle

Examples

--- He had studied Portuguese before he went

 to Brazil.

In this sentence first, he studied Portuguese, after that he went to Brazil.

--- Ana didn´t have any money because She had lost her wallet.

Analost her wallet first, for that reason she didnot have any money.

Present Perfect

We use it when an action happened in the past  at unspecified time.

has / have + past participle

Examples

--- I have seen that movie twenty times.
 This sentence means that this person saw twenty times the movie, the person didnot emphasize when, but It could see the movie again.

--- I think I have met him once before.

I met him in the past, when is not important.

Future perfect

The future perfect expresses an idea that something will occur before another action in the future.

will has / have + past pasrticiple

be going to has / have + past participle

Examples

--- I am not going to have finished all my homework by 5 o'clock.

This sentence means that I guess I won´t  finish my homework by 5 in the future

--- By next November, I will have received my promotion.

It means the she guesses that by November, she´ll promote.



Reflections 

In english as in spanish there are a lot of tenses... when we want to refer to an action that happened in past and continues in the future, or happen before that another action, we have to use the perfect tense. this tense has tree times (past perfect, present perfect, and future perfect). 

It is use as in spanish, this is one of the most difficult tenses that exist in english as in spanish... 

In the USA is really used this tense so, to know how to use this tense is really necessary for communicating with people, and also for making sense our sentences... 

In my case, when I started to learn this tense in English was to difficult, Sincerely I didn´t understand that meaning an that use, but now, It is totally different, I know how to apply this tense when I  am talking.