Conditionals

2º BACHILLERATO – IES CIUDAD JARDÍN 2017-2018

 CONDITIONAL SENTENCES

Conditionals are formed by two different clauses:

a conditional clause, starting with IF

+
a result clause

The order can be changed, but if the conditional

clauses comes first, it must be followed by a comma.

If I see her tonight, I will tell her about the party.

I will tell her about the party if I see her tonight

There are three different types of conditionals

structures.
 Conditional 0

FORM:

IF+ PRESENT SIMPLE ---------- PRESENT SIMPLE

If you are late, we don’t wait for you

USE:
It is used to talk about facts in the future
 Conditional 1

FORM:

IF+ PRESENT SIMPLE ---------- WILL + INFINITIVE

If he earns a lot of money, he will buy a new house

USE:
It is used to talk about facts in the future

You will study at university if you pass the exam

Also, we can use CONDITIONAL 1 for promises and

warnings

If you don’t pay, you will send to prison

 Conditional 2

FORM:

IF+ PAST SIMPLE ---------- WOULD/COULD + INFINITIVE

If I bought the car, I would travel to Barcelona

WERE-------- We can use WERE for 1st and 3rd person

singular

If I were a boy, I could understand how it feels to love a

girl. (Beyoncé’s song If I were a boy)

USE:
It is used for impossible facts and situations occurred in
the past
 Conditional 3

FORM:

IF+ PAST PERFECT -- WOULD/COULD+HAVE+ PARTICIPLE

If I had bought a ticket, I would have gone to the concert

I could have visited the Louvre if I had travelled to Paris

USE:
It is used for hypothetical past facts/events which never
occurred.
 Modals and conditional sentences

You can use modal verbs in the conditional 1 structures in

both parts of the clauses.

If you vote for Messi, he may win the award for best player

If you can’t write, you won’t do the exam.

Possibility ---- may/might Obligation---- must

Permission ----- can Suggestion---- should

You can use modal verbs in the conditional 2 structures
instead of WOULD, in the result clause.

If you had time, you could help me in the kitchen

Ability ---- could Possibility ---- might

You can use COULD in the conditional clause, to express

ability, permission or possibility

If you could find a job, you would help to buy a house

You can use modal verbs in the conditional 3 structures in
the result clause.

If I had cooked more, you could have tasted the dessert

Ability ---- could have Possibility ---- might have

You can use COULD + PERFECT INFINITIVE in the

conditional clause to express ability
If you could have driven, you would have arrived on time.
You can use UNLESS to include an exception or
contradiction to what you are saying

Unless=If not

You will gain weight unless you stop drinking so much

soda

You will gain weight if you don’t stop drinking so much

soda

Unless we have a lot of work, we will travel to Thailand

If we don’t have a lot of work, we will travel to Thailand

There are other words and expressions you can use that
have similar meanings to IF or UNLESS.
 WISHES AND REGRETS

You can use WISH + Past Perfect to express regrets

about the past.

I wish I had studied more

I did not study and now I regret about it

WISH + COULD to express a desire for the present

I wish I could go to London

=
I want to but I can’t
 WISHES AND REGRETS

WISH +WOULD to express dissatisfaction with what

somebody is doing in the present. We do not use this
about ourselves.

I wish she could stop drinking

She is drinking and I want her to stop