1. Paco's camera battery ran out

Conditional sentences can be real and unreal. Real conditional describes real-life situations while unreal conditional describes unreal, imaginary situations. Although the various conditional forms might seem quite abstract at first, they are actually some of the most useful structures in English and are commonly used in everyday conversations.
Icono IDevice Reading activity

When Paco arrived in Washington D.C., he was really tired after his days in New York. But he didn't want to relax and miss the chance to get to know the capital of the States in depth. So he took his camera and the guide book about Washington he had bought at the airport and started to walk around the city.

Paco would have bought a 16 GB memory card for his camera if he had known that he was going to take so many pictures. And he would have charged the battery if he had realized that his camera had run out of energy.

 

Theater where President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. The Capitol in Washington D.C. A typical street in Washington D.C.
By Henry Camacho. GNU license. By Henry Camacho. GNU license. By Henry Camacho. GNU license.

Washington was so different from New York! There were so many places to visit that it was a pity that Paco couldn't have taken as many pictures as he had liked, above all in the National Mall, which is an open-area national park in downtown Washington, D.C.

The National Mall is a unit of the National Park Service. The term National Mall commonly includes areas that are officially part of West Potomac Park and Constitution Gardens to the west, and it is often taken to refer to the whole area between the Lincoln Memorial and the Capitol, with the Washington Monument providing a division slightly west of the centre.


Do you think we can change the position of the if-clause and the main clause without a change in the meaning of the third type of conditional sentences?


Icono de IDevice de pregunta Self-Assessment activity
Watch the following presentation about the Third Conditional Sentences and choose the most appropriate answer.

 

 

1) Unreal conditionals are complex sentences that we use to express an imaginary or ...
  
a) ... impossible situation.
b) ... possible situation.

2) The third conditional is used to talk about things which ...
  
a) ... happened in the past.
b) ... did not happen in the past.

3) Third conditional: the if-clause is made in ______________ while the main clause is made with would (or another modal verb) + present perfect tense.
  
a) past perfect tense
b) simple past tense

Icono de iDevice Reflexión
The Past Unreal Conditional is used to talk about imaginary situations in the past. You can describe what you would have done differently or how something could have happened differently if circumstances had been different.
Conditional type III: no possibility

The first conditional and second conditionals talk about the future. With the third conditional we talk about the past, about a condition in the past that did not happen. That is why there is no possibility for this condition:

  CONDITION
 RESULT
  Past Perfect WOULD HAVE + Past Participle
If I had played tennis better I wouldn't have lost the game.

Notice that we use the past perfect tense to talk about the impossible past condition. We use WOULD HAVE + past participle to talk about the impossible past result. The important thing about third conditional sentences is that condition and result are impossible.

Icono de iDevice Solved exercise

1) I would have gone on foot if it __________ so much. ( not rain)

2) If I had won the lottery, I __________ around the world. ( travel)

3) The students __________ the test if they had studied harder. (pass)

4) If my father hadn't been so busy he __________ me a hand. (give)

5) If you __________ to New York city with me, you would have enjoyed it. (come)

Complete these conditional sentences type III with the verbs given in brackets.

Icono IDevice Curiosity
THE WHITE HOUSE
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the President of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., it was built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the late Georgian style and has been the residence of every U.S. President since John Adams. It was designed by Irish-born James Hoban. When Thomas Jefferson moved into the home in 1801, he (with architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe) expanded the building outward, creating two colonnades which were meant to conceal stables and storage.
South façade of the White House. The Red Room as designed by Stéphane Boudin during the administration of John F. Kennedy.
By upstateNyer. Creative Commons. By GearedBull. Public domain.

Today, the White House Complex includes the Executive Residence (in which the First Family resides), the West Wing (the location of the Oval Office, Cabinet Room, and Roosevelt Room), and the East Wing (the location of the office of the First Lady and White House Social Secretary), as well as the Old Executive Office Building, which houses the executive offices of the President and Vice President.

The White House is made up of six stories—the Ground Floor, State Floor, Second Floor, and Third Floor, as well as a two-story basement. The term White House is regularly used as a metonym for the Executive Office of the President of the United States and for the president's administration and advisors in general. The property is owned by the National Park Service and is part of the President's Park. In 2007, it was ranked second on the American Institute of Architects's list of "America's Favorite Architecture."

Taken from Wikipedia.


Icono IDevice Important
Conditionals with modal verbs
There are some special conditional forms for modal verbs in English:

 

If he hadn't studied so much he wouldn't have fallen asleep.
By A.M.Al Mutawee. Creative Commons.

  could have + past participle:

John could have passed the exam if he had studied harder.= It was possible for him to pass if he studied 

should have + past participle:

You should have passed the exam if you had studied harder.= That's what we expected 

might/may have:

You might have passed the exam if you hadn't made so many mistakes.= It's not sure, less certain than would have

 


Icono IDevice Further knowledge

If you need to remember the first and second conditionals, then have a look here.

English conditionals: type III.

A lot of information about the conditionals (in Spanish).

Here you have some exercises to practice the third conditional:

Exercise 1 Exercise 2 Exercise 3
Exercise 4
 Exercise 5
 Exercise 6

Would you like to see inside the White House? Watch the video. You'll be surprised.

 


We hope you don't have any questions about the uses and form of the type 3 conditional sentences. Now let's have a look at the special linguistic features of American pronunciation.
« Anterior | Siguiente »