Tenses - The Future

 **Decisions, decisions  (and Promises, promises)

Kid 1: When I grow up, I’m going to marry Tracey Downs.

Kid 2: Bet you don’t.

Kid 1: Why?

Kid 2: She’s marrying me. Nuh nuh-nuh NUH nuh.
Kid 1: You’re, like, so childish.

Statement of Form

Future with going to: subject + am/is/are + going to + base form

Future simple: subject + will (or might) + base form

With ‘probably’:

(positive) will probably

(negative) probably won’t

Students need to know

Native speakers have many different ways of referring to the future (there is no ‘future tense’) and if you ask them to say why they used a particular form, they will have no idea. This is a fairly reliable summary:

If you’re talking about a plan, use “going to”.

If it’s an arrangement with somebody, use the present continuous.

If, on the other hand, it’s something you’ve just , now, decided, (including making an offer, promise or threat) use “will”.

You might be making a prediction, in which case it depends whether you just ‘feel’ it in your bones (“will”), or you have ‘evidence’ to support the prediction (“going to”).

Unfortunately, students in practice rarely know, or have time to work out, if they've got evidence or not.

“Will” and “going to” both indicate certainty, so if you’re not so sure, you need “might”, or “probably”.
For something seen as "fixed" in the future, like a timetabled event, we can use the present simple.

“Will” also pops up a lot in:

 promises…

♬ And you'll never walk alone,
You'll N-E-V-E-R walk...♬

(Ok, we get it.)

… offers…

Friendly stranger: “I’ll help you with those heavy bags, Madam.”

… threats…

Paranoid tourist: “Go away, or I’ll call the Police.”

… and refusals.

Friendly stranger: “She won’t let me help her, the ungrateful, toffee-nosed...”

[Err, that’s enough, let’s have the movie quote:]

Withnail: "I'll show the lot of you! I'm gonna be a star!"

Students struggle with

Which form to use, as they are often essentially the same. As we’ve seen, all three, in their basic forms can express certainty. "Going to" and "Present continuous" can both be used for plans. "Will" and "going to” both make predictions. Notice how these two forms are often used interchangeably on the weather forecast:

"And now the climate change weather: They'll suffer from the sun in Siberia.  It's going to positively pour down in Persia, and it’ll be fairly foggy in France. Britain – start checking your insurance."

The student’s strategy for straightening out the confusion is just to use “will” for any reference to the future. After all, they believe, it IS the future, isn’t it? It can be, but it often isn’t. As a result, the most common error is for students to overuse “will”.

Presentation idea

Climate change weather forecast (predictions)

It is widely understood that climate change will mean unexpected weather in many locations. Establish this with the students.  Optionally, get a world map – write above it whatever day tomorrow will be. So if your lesson is on a Wednesday, put Thursday. Place (or draw) on it some obvious symbols for the weather – rain, cloud, hot weather, snow perhaps. Pre-prepare some sentences about the weather, cut into two pieces:

          “It will be hot                                     in Murmansk.”

          “You’re going to have snow                in the Sahara.”

          “Scotland will see temperatures        of 35 to 40 degrees.”

          “They isn’t going to be              much rain in Manchester.”

SS are given these mixed up. Referring to your map, they have to match the two pieces to make accurate sentences. You then have several examples from which to highlight that we can use either the “will” or “going to” structure to express a prediction. Elicit from students a few more examples of likely bizarre conditions if global warming takes hold.

Fun practice

Don’t spoil it! (Present simple for the “unchangeable future”)

Establish with the class that few things are more annoying than someone spoiling a movie by telling you what is going to happen. Select two short, interesting video clips for the class to watch. They should be easy to follow with the sound turned off. If they are genuinely funny, this is ideal. Get half the students to turn away (or go out of the room for a time). The other half watch and enjoy the clip. Then swap around with the second clip. Now pair up a student from each group and have everyone watch each clip. The idea is that those who have seen it “spoil” it for the student watching it for the first time by stating what is just about to happen:

E.g. He falls over. She hits him. The police arrive, but they’re too late.

Optionally, get the listener in each pair to react angrily:

Don’t spoil it!

I’ve got a secret.  (Arrangements) Tell the class that they will be asking questions to guess what someone’s arrangements are for that weekend. Select two of the strongest students to go out of the room. Tell the class they have gone out of the room to concoct a fictitious set of arrangements. When they return, the class will have twenty Yes / No questions with which to find out all of the following:

What the arrangement is, where, what time, who with, planned mode of transport.

Then go and talk to the two students outside the room, making sure you cannot be heard by those in the room. THERE ARE NO ARRANGEMENTS. Instead, when the pair go back into the room, they simply answer “Yes” if the question ended in a vowel, and “No”, if it ended in a consonant! (Note, having two students answering means they can confer in a whisper if need be – seemingly checking their story, but in reality checking their spelling!)

E.g:

Q1: “Are you going to a party?”

“No, we aren’t.”

Q2: “Are you meeting some friends?”

“No, we aren’t.”

Q3: “Are you going to the cinema?”

“Yes, we are!”

Q4 “Are you meeting at lunchtime?”

“Yes, we are!”

Q5: “Are you going by train?”

“No, we aren’t.”

Q6: “Are you going by bicycle?”

“Yes, we are!”

And so on. Stop the activity when you reach twenty questions asked, or the five “facts” have been discovered. Get the inquisitors to summarise the plans. You can then reveal what was really going on – and prepare to take some derision. Wait until you have a completely fresh class to try it again, or next time, let the students going outside decide fresh criteria (e.g. Answer “Yes” if the question has more than seven words; if it uses the letters “k” or “j”…)