MONDAY 13th DECEMBER

“I strive to be an upstanding member of society”

“Participating in the political process is one of the primary
requirements of a citizen.”
“If you are genuinely interested in improving yourself, you
will try to be interested in others.”
“There aren’t enough conscientious people to change the
current state of the world.”

GERUNDS + INFINITIVES
What?
- The verb patterns we use when we have two verbs
together, with or without an object.
- The forms of verbs we see in different parts of clauses
→ i.e as subjects etc.

How
- Most of this topic involves remembering which “list”
a verb is on, i.e what follows it.
- There are some general rules that are helpful to
remember
- Some verbs are on more than one list → you can
use with both gerunds and infinitives
- with some of these ^, the meaning changes
depending on which you use, but sometimes it
doesn’t

Read these and compare the difference in meaning.

I stopped taking photos.
I stopped to take photos.

I don’t remember feeding the cat.

I didn’t remember to feed the cat.

I try to exercise three times a week.

Have you tried switching it off and on again?
General Rules
Gerunds
- More common as subjects
- After some common phrases
- It’s not worth + ger
- It’s no good/use + ger
- There’s no point (in) +
ger
Infinitives
- No ‘to’ (base form) - after modal verbs
- Modal phrases → ‘had better’,
‘would rather’
- Imperatives
(orders/instructions)

- with ‘to’
- after adjectives/comparatives/superlatives/ordinal
numbers → “It’s easy to study in this class”
- The phrase ‘it’s time’ → “It’s time to go”
- Quantifier + noun → “I’ve got enough food to last
a month”
FORMS (ACTIVE ---------> PASSIVE)

ACTIVE
GERUNDS
Present - meeting
Perfect - having met

INFINITIVES
Simple - to distract
Continuous - to be distracting

Perfect - to have completed

Perf. Continuous - to have been studying

-----------------------------------------
PASSIVE
GERUNDS
Present - being completed
Perfect - having been told

INFINITIVES
Simple - to be distracted
Continuous - to be being distracted*

Perfect - to have been forced

Perf. Continuous - to have been being taught * *never
use!