Past tense (2)

Reading

Read the following text and answer the questions.

Jack and the boys

Jack was in the playground at lunchtime. He was eleven years old and a very quiet boy. He was new at the school and didn’t have any friends yet. When he heard someone call to him, “Hey kid,” he turned around. There were two boys behind him. He didn’t know the boys but they looked a lot older. “What’s your name, kid?” asked one of them. “Jack Johnson,” Jack said. The boy said, “Well, Jack. We’ve decided that you are going to give us £2 tomorrow. Now, if you don’t, then we are going to hit you, hard.” Jack believed what he heard. “Why are you picking on me?” he asked. The boys looked at him and said, “Because we don’t like the way you look”. Then the boys started to leave. But one of the boys turned around and said, “And if you tell anybody, we’ll hit you even harder.” Jack stood there and thought about the boys. He thought about giving them money. Then he thought about not giving them money. Then he thought about them hitting him. He wondered what was wrong with the way he looked. When Miss Dickson, his class teacher, told the children to come inside again, he wanted to tell her about the boys. But he remembered what they said. They would hit him even harder. All afternoon Jack couldn’t think about maths and English. All he could think about was the big boys. At the end of the day Miss Dickson asked him if there was a problem. Jack told her that everything was OK. That evening Jack said nothing during the meal. His mother asked him three times for the salt. But he was thinking about school and the boys and not the salad and the salt.
Jack’s mother asked him if he felt ill. He said that he felt OK. She asked him if anything was a problem at school. He said that everything was fine at school. She looked at him.

a. Who was in the story? 

b. Where did the story happen? 

c. When did the story happen? 

d. What did the big boys want?

Grammar

Decide if the sentence is in the simple present or the simple past.

a. Yesterday I _______________ (to clean) my room and then I _______________ (to phone) my friend to go shopping. I _______________ (to want) a new jacket. I _______________ (to be) excited.

b. Now I _______________ (to be) in town and my friend _______________ (to be) with me. We always _______________ (to go) to the big shop in Main Street.

c. I _______________ (to buy) a new jacket every year. Last year my mother _______________ (to try) to give me her old jacket but I _______________ (to say) NO!

d. She often _______________ (to try) to give me her old clothes, but hey! She _______________ (to be) an old lady and I _______________ (to be) a young girl!

Translation

Say it in English. 

a. Sage auf Englisch, dass gestern jemand deinem Bruder einen Brief geschickt hat. 

b. Sage auf Englisch, dass du den Brief gefunden hast. 

c. Sage auf Englisch, dass du auf deinen Bruder gewartet hast. 

d. Sage auf Englisch, dass du ihm den Brief gegeben hast.