Tenses in reported speech. When reporting what people say or think in English, we need to remember that the rules for tense forms in reported speech are exactly ...
But, if the reporting verb is in the past tense, then usually we change the tenses in the reported speech: Direct speech: I like ice cream. Reported speech: She ...
Here are some commands in reported speech: Be quiet! -> She told me to be quiet. Don’t touch that! -> He told me not to touch that. Brush your teeth. -> She told me to brush my teeth. Finally, when reporting speech, you must always consider the …
If the reporting verb (first part) of the sentence is in present or future tense, the tense of the reported speech is not changed while converting direct speech ...
REPORTED SPEECH TENSE CONVERSION RULES Direct Speech Reported Speech “I want a holiday” (Present Simple) She told me she wanted a holiday (Past Simple) “Bob is annoying me” (Present Continuous) Jane said Bob was annoying her (Past Continuous) “I have eaten too much” (Present Perfect) He said he had eaten too much (Past Perfect)
Reported speech: She says (that) she likes ice cream. We don't need to change the tense, though probably we do need to change the 'person' from 'I' to 'she', for example. We also may need to change words like 'my' and 'your'. (As I'm sure you know, often, we can choose if we want to use 'that' …
Reported speech tenses may differ from the tense of the direct speech. The general rule for tenses in reported speech is that it changes to the past tense.