Conditionals - Mixed

If you’d called the repair company like I told you, we’d have a working microwave now.

If you’d read the instruction book like I suggested, we wouldn't have a charcoal meringue.

Statement of Form

If + past perfect, would + base form OR

If + past simple, would + have + past participle

What students need to know

It's called mixed because it mixes references to past and present, both being hypothetical. It doesn't matter which half of the sentence does which:

Ed: “If you had any balls, you’d have asked the girl in the pink dress to dance.”

Seth: “If you’d had your glasses on, you’d know why I didn’t.”

         

Let’s look more closely at this:

Ed: You, Seth, lack courage (generally); for this reason you missed a fantastic opportunity (in the past).

Seth: You, Ed, lacked adequately corrected vision (in the past), which perhaps explains why you are so clueless. (now and generally)

What students struggle with

Depression and paranoia mainly, when it dawns on them that we've been lying to them all along. When they realize that, in fact, conditionals rarely slot into the neat categories of “first”, “second” and “third” that they met earlier in their studies. This is more like how people really speak.

They have to work out what time they’re talking about in each part of the sentence, and bring to mind the correct structure to reflect that, and then form it – complete with complex phonology involving weak forms and contractions. Quite a big ask.

Generative situation

Fretting parents Perhaps draw a rough picture of parents and daughter on the board. Explain to students that the daughter is a teenager and is going out to a party with friends for the first time. Get students to list all the things the parents would probably worry about:

how, and what time, she’ll get home; who she’s going with, who else is going to be there; will she meet any boys? Will she drink too much?

Get students to feedback their ideas and put them on the board.

Next, tell the class that the parents are worried because she hasn’t come home from the party (and it is nearly ten o’clock!). Try to elicit how they would express their anxieties:

“If she’d caught the bus, she’d be here by now.”

“If she didn’t catch the bus, she’d have called us.”

“If she’d met a boy, she wouldn’t want to go home with him.” etc.

There should be enough here to highlight the mixed nature of these conditionals.

Fun practice

Badly organized trip. Get students to list things that people might forget to take on a trip to the seaside: sun cream, kids’ armbands, a towel, plastic cutlery, blanket, swimming costume. Then get them to list some of the consequences:

no sun-cream – need to wear T-shirt.

no swimming trunks – no swimming.

T- shirt not clean – looks bad

Establish that families can easily fall out when trips go awry. Then get them to imagine a fractious dialogue, starting with eliciting an example like this:

“If you’d brought the sun-cream I wouldn’t need to wear my T-shirt!”

“Well, if you’d washed it any time in the last six months, that wouldn’t be a problem!”

Get students to extend it for a few lines. They can then practice reading it out loud and act it out.

Other possible lines:

“Well if you’d remembered the radio I wouldn’t have to listen to you!”

“Well, if you’d brought the kids’ trunks they could go for a swim.”

“Well, if you’d packed the plastic forks, we could eat something.”

“We’d all have towels to sit on if you hadn’t given them to the charity shop.”

… and that will probably do; there’s plenty of practice involved here. (Note the use of ‘could’: perfectly natural and, at the level of student who would be studying mixed conditionals, not a problem at all. Don’t insist on ‘would’.)

Smug marrieds. Draw a simple sketch of two people, and somehow establish that they are married, with kids. Show them smiling to underline how happy they are. Write on the board:

“Just think, If we hadn’t met at that party,… “ Elicit possible ways of completing it with reference to the present:

… we wouldn’t be married

… we wouldn’t have this lovely house

….We wouldn’t have these great kids

… you would be married to Kasia Kowalska*

… yes, and you’d be married to Tarkan!*

Then elicit, “We’re so lucky!”, highlight that the two people would say this in unison, and drill it with exaggerated stress: We’re SOOH lucky!! *Let the class substitute whatever names seem amusing to them.”

Next, students practice the short conversation in pairs. After swapping pairs a few times, encourage the class to feel free to make changes to the script, while sticking to the basic plan.