Reported speech

Direct speech Reported (indirect) speech

• Present Simple  • Past Simple

“My students love English” The teacher said that her students
loved English.

• Past Continuous
• Present Continuous  The students said that they were
“We are listening attentively” listening attentively.

• Past Perfect
Lara said that she hadn’t written her
• Present Perfect  essay.
“I haven’t written my essay”
• Past Perfect Continuous
The students said that they had been
studying for hours for that exam.
• Present Perfect Continuous
“We have been studying for
• Past Simple 
“The test was awful”
• Past Continuous 
“I got an F because Dino was
distracting me”
• Past Perfect 
“I didn’t correct your tests
because I had lost them”
• Past Perfect Continuous
“I hadn’t been listening to you
at all”
• Past Perfect
Students said that the test had
been awful.
• Past Perfect Continuous
John said that he had gotten an
F because Dino had been
distacting him.
• Past Perfect
The teacher said that she hadn’t
corrected our tests because she
had lost them.
• Past Perfect Continuous
The teacher said that she hadn’t
been listening to us at all.
• WILL  • WOULD
“You will get extra The teacher said that we
homework” would get extra homework.
• COULD
• CAN  Lucia said that she could
“I can help you with this task” help me with that task.

• MIGHT
• MAY  Ann said that she might not
“I may not be in school be in school the next day.
tomorrow”
• Infinitive
• Imperative  The teacher told us to open
“Open your workbooks” our workbooks.
 What else changes?
• Here • There
• This, these • That, those
• Today, tonight • That day, that night
• Yesterday • The day before
• Last week/ month • The previous week /the
week before
• Tomorrow • The next/ the following
• Next week/ month day/ week/ month