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Have you ever had difficulties with the present perfect?
Well, if you have, you're in the right place because today we're looking at the present perfect when talking about experiences.
Are you ready? Let's get started!
Welcome to The Coffee Break English Show!
I'm Nick. And I'm Francesca.
How are you today, Francesca?
I'm really well, Nick, thank you.
And I'm again, as always, very excited about another episode of the Coffee Break English Show.
Yes, today is my favourite grammar topic.
Is it? The present perfect.
Tell us again, so the present perfect.
And the present perfect can be used for lots of different contexts.
But today we're looking at how we can use it to talk about our experiences in the conversation.
Okay, so okay I always personally I always find it a little bit tricky when it comes to choose between the present perfect and the simple past and maybe we will talk about that as well a little bit.
We will, absolutely.
It's a really important distinction but luckily with this context it's nice and easy for us to understand the difference, so we'll definitely look at that.
But first let's look at the structure of the present perfect.
So we make the present perfect with the auxiliary verb have or has in the third person, and the past participle.
And in questions when we talk about experiences we can use the adverb ever.
Ah, yes, of course.
I can ask you Francesca, have you ever been to Japan?
Sadly, no, I haven't, or I have never been to Japan.
But I think you have been to France.
Have you been to France?
Yes, I've been to France several times.
Excellent, okay, and there we've seen the short answer, yes I have, or the full answer, no I've never been.
okay and then that takes us on to an extra bonus point here it's a really important area to look at and that's the the verbs been and gone ah there's a subtle difference there and at times i find it a little bit confusing well let's see if we can clear that up um so the difference between them we have the past participle been okay which is of course the past participle of be but in this case we could even think of it as the past participle of go okay and the idea here is that I've done something and I've stopped doing that and I've returned okay I've gone somewhere and now I have returned from that experience
so it's some sort of completed action?
Exactly. So an example could be Anna has been to the supermarket.
Okay. She has food in her fridge and she is now at home.
Okay so she went to the supermarket and she's back so she's no longer in the supermarket, is that right?
Exactly, correct. Whereas gone, gone is about an action.
It's the idea that someone has left, they've departed from somewhere and they have not returned.
Okay so if we take the supermarket example again?
Exactly! So Anna this time has gone to the supermarket.
Okay. She is not at home and she's at the supermarket now.
Right. That's interesting.
Okay. Because I think that doesn't work in the same way in other languages so it's interesting to know the difference that the two verbs convey in English.
Exactly, it's very very subtle.
Yes, indeed. So we do a little test on that.
Test me. I'm ready.
Have you ever been to Paris or have you ever gone to Paris?
Which one sounds better?
Okay, I would say because I'm here, I would say have you ever been to Paris.
The idea is you're, you went to Paris but you're now back to the original place.
Absolutely. And a good tip here is that when we use have you ever we're usually talking about our experiences.
So it's most likely going to be been and not gone in that case.
Okay, that's really good to know.
So we're on to the part that you were interested in.
Oh the difference between the two past tenses.
Yes so we said that the Present Perfect introduces a general experience.
Okay. we don't have a specific time okay pass simple we use to give specific details about a past experience okay emphasizes that the experiences finished right okay okay so I could ask you have you ever visited Rome Francesca I have obviously and I have visited Rome but then if I want to you more information about a specific visit maybe that is the case when I switched to the simple past. Exactly I can ask you when did you go?
Okay I went to Rome last summer for example.
And what did you do?
I visited the Colosseum, I had a lot of ice cream, I had a lot of pizza and I met up with some friends who live in Rome.
Okay brilliant and So we've used the past simple to talk about that experience all the time there because we're, imagine we're in that past moment and we're reliving it in our head.
Okay, that's great.
So that leads us to our fun part of today's episode and we're going to play a game to practice.
A game? Oh, I love a game, okay.
So we're going to play a game called two truths one line.
I'm going to give you three present perfect sentences about me.
Two of them are true, and one is a lie.
And you try to guess which one is a lie.
Right, let's see. And if you're watching or listening at home, you try and guess to help Francesca.
Are you ready? Yes, I am.
Okay, so the first one… I have been to Africa.
I have been to Africa, okay.
The second one, I have been skydiving.
Oh, I've been skydiving.
And number three, I have worked in a high school.
Okay, I worked in a high school.
Okay, so let me think.
So I know you have been teaching for quite some time, so I think you have definitely worked in a high school.
But I also know you're a very adventurous person.
So I'm not too sure about the other two.
Can I ask you a question?
Of course you can. Did you go to Africa on your own?
No I didn't… I went with my brother and my mom.
Ah so you have been to Africa!
I might be lying. But I still think you have been to Africa and you have worked in a high school.
because I think one day I also heard you talking about Africa during our lunch break.
Maybe, maybe. Okay, so that's my final answer, so… You're right, I have never been skydiving, so good detective.
So shall we do a quick review of the present perfect?
Yes, because we have covered quite a lot in this episode.
So we looked first at the structure of the present perfect.
We talked about our experiences using the present perfect.
We looked at the difference between the past participle being and gone.
That was really useful.
Yeah, should we do a little test?
Yes, why not? If I have been to the shops, where am I now?
You are back home or where you originally started from.
And if I have gone to the shops, You're still there.
Exactly. Okay. And then we looked at the present perfect and the past simple together to talk about experiences.
Yes and I think the example we provided about my experience in Rome was really useful because we could see how the two tenses can co -exist within the same context.
Absolutely. And in fact it was really good for showing that the present perfect is used for general experiences and the past simple is for those specific actions in the past. Yes that's right.
Well great if you want more practice with the present perfect, check out this video here or you'll find a link in the description.
And remember you can read the blog article on this episode for more information on this topic and some fun exercises for you to practice.
The link is in the podcast description too.
And you can also sign up for our free weekly emails to receive a mini English lesson each week.
Thank you so much for joining me again today, I've had so much fun as always!
Me too, thank you very much Nick.
And thank you for watching or listening at home.
Until next time, happy coffee breaking!
Bye! languages production for the Radio Lingua Network.
Copyright 2025, Radio Lingua Limited.
Recording copyright 2025, Radio Lingua Limited.
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