Dr Fingers’ Error Correction Clinic

Hello everybody, and welcome to my “Error Correction” clinic. You know just the other day I heard and recorded the following conversation in one of my classes. There are some errors. See if you can find them.

Dr Fingers: Good morning, class. Right, who has stolen my glasses? They were here on my desk just a minute ago and now they’ve disappeared. Right, I will count to three, and I expect the “thief” to put them back. One, two… oh, here they are, on my head. How silly! OK, class, now we’re going to do a little exercise.

Today’s class: Indirect speech with “tell”

Class: Oh, no! Dr Fingers: Yes! Now, be quiet! Right, Petra, come to the front of the class. Now, Petra, here is a list of sentences. I want you to say these sentences in indirect speech. Remember, we use indirect speech to report what someone has said. Use the verb “to tell”, and make the sentence using “I” as the subject. Petra: OK, that’s easy: 1. “Come!” - and the answer is, “I told her that she comes”; 2. “Give the drink to me!” - and the answer is, “I told him that he gives the drink to me”; and, 3. “Go!” - and the answer is “I told them that they go”. Direct speech Indirect speech

“Go away!” “She told me to go away” “Eat it!” “He told me to eat it” “Drive slowly!” “They told us to drive slowly”

Solutions

Later, I disciplined my student privately for a few hours, and now I think she understands the rule. Let’s listen to her again: Petra: 1. “Come!” - and the answer is, “I told her to come”; 2. “Give the drink to me!” - and the answer is, “I told him to give the drink to me”; and, 3. “Go!” - and the answer is “I told them to go”. Dr Fingers: Well done, Petra. As I always say, “no pain, no gain”.

OK, that’s all for today, bye for now and may you have an errorfree month.

Dr Fingers: OK, class… (fades out)

Problems

Did you hear the mistakes? Poor Petra got all her sentences wrong. These are very typical errors and we have to help her. When we use the verb “tell” to report what someone has told us to do, the construction goes like this: “Tell + object + infinitive with “to”. For example:

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