‘If’ sentences - Form
NB When the ‘If’ clause comes first, a comma is necessary. It is not necessary to put a comma when the ‘If’ clause comes second:
If you revise these Units, you’ll improve your English language knowledge.
You’ll improve your English language knowledge if you revise these Units.
Note
The table above mentions Present Forms and Past Forms. This is because we can use:
The Simple Present, Present Progressive or Present Perfect for a Present Form
The Simple Past or Past Progressive for a Past Form
Present Forms:
If teachers teach History in an interesting way, students will like it.
If teachers are teaching teenagers, they will have to adapt to their learning styles.
If teachers have taught teenagers, they will know what this means.
Past Forms:
It would be wonderful if students learnt everything we taught them..
If students were learning Latin instead of English, there would be little chance to practise Speaking.
Passives in ‘if’ sentences:
We have already looked at Passives in Unit 7. We saw that we can change most tenses into the passive.
The two sentences below are in the passive:
If assignments are handed in by Monday, they will be returned by the end of the week.
If subjects were taught using only the mother tongue, students would be underprepared for work mobility.
If the Panama Canal hadn’t been built, ships would have had to sail around South America to get to the Pacific.
If Edison hadn’t been backed by JP Morgan, his light bulb wouldn’t have had the success it did.
What we have here is the Passive of the tenses usually used in different ‘if’ sentences.