Why you have some explaining to do

You've got some explaining to do. Well, maybe not you personally, and what you did or didn't do the other night is certainly none of my business.

But if you're a language teacher, you'd better explain a thing or two about time. In that respect, we've all got some serious explaining to do.

Time is of the essence. And not only because there never seems to be enough of it. It's a critical part of understanding verb forms. So the meaning of the word 'time' is crucial when learning a language.?

It's also a source of misunderstanding for students of English. Just imagine the confusion: why is it that a basic tense labelled 'present' refers to either past, present or future? How does that make sense to learners?

"The term Future Perfect has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be,"?Douglas Adams wrote. And I cracked up over his mention of tenses for time travellers, like the Future Semiconditional Modified Subinverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional.?

But all kidding aside, you don't need the complications of time travel to get confused about tenses. There's the everyday notion of time, and then there's the grammatical term. The two are not the same - but how should students know that? We've got some serious explaining to do.?

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