Lesson 20 of 24
What Is Everyone Doing? Checkpoint
about 15 minutes
After this lesson you can
- Say what someone is doing right now, and tell that apart from what they usually do.
Words this lesson teaches
- あそびます
- plays
- つつ
- a tube
- もちます
- holds, has on them
- いま
- now
- じょうきょう
- the situation, status
What it explains
Vています — doing it right now
Te-form plus います: さがしています, is searching. This is the difference between さがします, which covers habit and future both, and さがしています, which is happening as you speak. A status board is almost entirely ています, and a schedule is almost entirely ます.
The same form for a state, not an action
もっています does not mean is in the act of picking up; it means has, right now. Some verbs work this way — すわっています is sitting rather than in the process of sitting down, しっています is knows. Learn these individually as they come; there is no rule that predicts which verbs do it.
もう and まだ with ています
もう みつけました, already found it. まだ さがしています, still looking. And the negative pair: まだ みつけていません, have not found it yet — which is a softer thing to report than みつけませんでした, because it leaves the search open.
The scene itself is in the app.
Lesson one of this track is free to read in full. From lesson two on, the story, the audio and the review are part of a free account.
