Concetti Chiave
- Must is used to express an obligation and is always followed by a verb in its base form.
- Must remains the same for all subjects and can self-interrogate and self-negate.
- Can is used to request permission or express a specific ability, with a unique structure for affirmative, negative, and interrogative forms.
- The negative form of can is created by adding "not" after can, and the interrogative form places can before the subject.
- The past ability of can is expressed using "to be able to" with the past tense of "to be".
I modali must e can
Must tradotto letteralmente in italiano vuol dire dovere.
Must esprime, quindi, un obbligo.
Must è un modale perché:
- è sempre seguito da un verbo alla forma base;
- è uguale per tutte le persone;
- si auto-interroga e auto-nega.
Alcune frasi in cui viene utilizzato il modale must possono essere:
- I must go to the school every day;
- Every morning he must make his bed when he gets up;
- We must not (mustn't) open the door to unknown people;
- You must do your homework before we have dinner.
Can viene utilizzato per chiedere un permesso o per esprimere una determinata abilità.
Can non rispetta la regola degli altri verbi poiché anche lui è un modale e si sposta e si carica il not.
La forma affermativa si forma: soggetto + can + verbo
La forma negativo si forma: soggetto + can + not + verbo
La forma interrogativa si forma: can + sogetto + verbo + ?
Per esempio:
- I can speak Spanish very good.
- She can't swim because she is afraid of water
- We can play ice hockey.
- They can't cycling because they are babies.
- Can you play volleyball with us?
Il passato di can si esprime con l'espressione "to be able to" usando il passato di to be, ad esempio:
- When I was a child I was able to jump very high;
- Last year she wasn't able to speak English fluently;
- We were able to enter in the expo