Name: Eric Martins Cerqueira

Grammar Exercise 1. Use the simple present to describe what generally happens (but not necessarily right now):
Ex: Families there often earn little money and have limited job opportunities, making it difficult to provide food, clothing and medications for their children.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/18/health/helping-chernobyl-children/index.html?hpt=hp_t5

2. Use the present progressive to describe what is happening right now or in the extended present (for example nowadays, this month, these days, this year): Ex: Perhaps the grumkins are hungry this year.
Source: Book: A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, Pocket Edition, page 186.

3. Use the simple present to talk about situations that are not connected to time for example scientific laws:
Ex: Another radioactive chemical from the reactor explosion, Cesium-137, has a half-life of about 30 years, so it stays around a lot longer than iodine-131 and can still be measured in some soils and foods in several areas of Europe.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/18/health/helping-chernobyl-children/index.html?hpt=hp_t5

4. The simple present is often used in book or movies reviews:

Ex: " The Spirit Level - Written by two epidemiologists, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, this book makes a strong, statistics-based argument that ugly social problems -- from obesity to incarceration rates -- are associated with unequal societies. Better health and well-being would follow, they argue, if our societies were made to be more equal.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/19/opinion/sutter-inequality-must-reads/index.html?hpt= hp_t4

5. The present progressive is often used with always to express a repeated action:
Ex: He(Jon) missed his brothers Bran, stubborn and curious, always wanting to follow and join in whatever Jon and Robb were doing.
Source: Book: A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, Pocket Edition, page 179.

6. Use the simple past to describe an action that was completed at a specific time in the past:
Ex: More than 4,000 such cases were diagnosed from 1992 to 2002, but it's impossible to say which ones were caused by Chernobyl radiation.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/18/health/helping-chernobyl-children/index.html?hpt=hp_t5

7. Use the past progressive to describe an action that was in progress at a specific time in the past. The action began before the specific time and may or may not continue after the specific time: Ex: Nearby, Marillion the singer sat oiling his woodharp, complaining of what the damp was doing to his strings.
Source: Book: A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, Pocket Edition, page 329.

8. Use the past progressive with the simple past to talk about an action that interrupted by another action. Use the simple past for the interrupting action. Connect the two actions with while + past progressive or when + simple past:
Ex: The people were getting off a local passenger train when the fast-moving express train plowed into them, officials said.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/19/world/asia/india-train-deaths/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

9. You can use the past progressive with while or when to talk about two actions in progress at the same time in the past. Use the past progressive in both clauses:
Ex: The girl brushed her hair until it shone like molten silver, while the old woman anointed her with the spiceflower perfume of the Dothraki plains
Source: Book: A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, Pocket Edition, page 33.

10. Sentences with two clauses in the simple past have a very different meaning from sentences with one clause in the simple past and one clause in the past progressive:
Ex: She tried running from the bear but it caught her, dropped her to the ground, and scraped and clawed at her, she said.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/19/us/bear-attacks/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

Ex: When he turned back at the door, she was holding it (sword) again, trying for balance.
Source: Book: A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, Pocket Edition, page 98.