Habitual states or actions are regular occurrences that can be physical, mental, or emotional. The Past Simple tense in English often expresses these habitual states or actions that occurred in the past but may no longer happen in the present. Learn more about how language can indicate habitual states or actions and how they are defined in the English Grammar Profile.
The text discusses the use of “so much” and “a lot” as adverbs of degree in English grammar. These phrases modify verbs to indicate a high degree or intensity of an action. For example, in the sentence “You bother me a lot”, “a lot” intensifies the verb “bother”. Similarly, in “He loved it so much that he continued to show up every week”, “so much” intensifies “loved” and the phrase “so much that” establishes a cause-effect relationship between the high degree of love and the action of showing up every week.
Words like ‘once’ and ‘twice’ can be predeterminers as multipliers. For example: “Once every two weeks” “Twice a day” A search in the iWeb corpus for: once _AT1 _NNT 1 ONCE A WEEK 75774 We are proposing to meet at least once a week and just to do as many collections as we can. listen 2 ONCE A MONTH 44242 3 ONCE A YEAR 43510 4 ONCE A DAY …
Let’s look at two expert examples of ‘BE + adverbs of indefinite frequency + VERBing‘: At the time of application for Russian citizenship, the spouses must be permanently residing in Russia and must be married for three years. Russia Beyond – 16 Feb 2021 There are a few ways to approach loved ones who are persistently asking the same question. elmcroft.com The first example above is a modal verb + BE + adverb + present participle and the second …
present continuous + adverbs of indefinite frequency Read More »
Adverbs of indefinite frequency, such as ‘sometimes’, ‘occasionally’, ‘usually’, ‘normally’, ‘regularly’, and ‘often’, are commonly used with the present simple tense to indicate routine or repeated activities without specifying exact timing. These adverbs typically precede the main verb but follow the verb ‘to be’ and auxiliary verbs. They can also be positioned at the beginning or end of a sentence in some cases. The webpage provides examples of these usages in various contexts, including TED talks and student writings.
In contrast, definite adverbs of frequency, like ‘yearly’, ‘weekly’, ‘every hour’, and ‘every day’, provide exact frequencies and usually appear at the end of a sentence. The webpage also highlights the overlap and differences in the usage of these adverbs at different language proficiency levels (A1 and A2).
Furthermore, it presents common collocates for the adverb ‘usually’ and examples of sentences using ‘often’. The examples illustrate common behaviors or thought processes, suggesting that these adverbs are integral to expressing frequency in English.
