ninthenglishroommickgomez

REPORTING VERBS Some reporting verbs may appear in more than one of the following groups because they can be used in several ways. VERBS FOLLOWED BY "IF" OR "WHETHER" ask know remember say see VERBS FOLLOWED BY A "THAT" add admit agree announce answer argue boast claim comment complain confirm consider deny doubt estimate explain fear feel insist mention observe persuade propose remark remember repeat reply report reveal say state suggest suppose tell think understand warn VERBS FOLLOWED BY EITHER "THAT" OR AN INFINITIVE WITH "TO" decide expect guarantee hope promise swear threaten VERBS FOLLOWED BY A "THAT" CLAUSE CONTAINING SHOULD, WHICH MAY BE OMITTED, LEAVING A SUBJECT + ZERO-INFINITIVE   advise beg demand insist prefer propose recommend request sugges

Reported Statements When do we use reported speech? Sometimes someone says a sentence, for example "I'm going to the cinema tonight". Later, maybe we want to tell someone else what the first person said. Here's how it works: We use a 'reporting verb' like 'say' or 'tell'. ( Click here for more about using 'say' and 'tell' .) If this verb is in the present tense, it's easy. We just put 'she says' and then the sentence: Direct speech: “I like ice cream”. Reported speech: She  says  (that) she  likes  ice cream. We don't need to change the tense, though probably we do need to change the 'person' from 'I' to 'she', for example. We also may need to change words like 'my' and 'your'. (As I'm sure you know, often, we can choose if we want to use 'that' or not in English. I've put it in brackets () to show that it's optional. It'