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Many students, even some with a good level of English, ask me about the “be able” structure because it confuses them. This is not strange since in Spanish there is nothing similar.
Therefore, to understand this structure, you must have some clear grammatical concepts in advance.
Here are six concepts cla look for in t ender how it is used “be able (I to)” 1. What is “be able”? “Be able” is the verb “to be” plus an adjective that is “able”, which never varies in the sentence. What is conjugated is the verb ”
2. What does “be able” mean? It means “to be able to” . 3. What does “be able” sound like? It sounds something like “bi eibol”. Listen to it here. 4. When is “be able” used? It is used in two situations: 1 ) When you want to indicate that you are capable of doing something, that is, you have a certain “ability”. For example: He ‘s able to jump 100 meters. He is capable of jumping 100 meters. However, in general, to express that one has “knowledge ” of some skill, it is more frequent to use “ca n”. Examples:
- I canI know how to swim.
- They canplay football. They can play soccer.
- We canWe know how to sing.
Now, when something presents some difficulty and you can do it, it is more common to use “be able”.
For example:
- I was ableto open the door. I could, I was able to open the door (because it was stuck, for example).
2 ) In certain verb tenses when it is NOT possible to use “can” or “could” (could, could) because two modal verbs (*) cannot be put together, or because the verb tense does not allow it.
For example, in the future.
- I can’t say: I will cango to your party next Saturday. I can go to your party next Saturday.
- Yes I can say: I will be ableto go to your party next Saturday.
(*) “Will” and “Can” are modal verbs, that is, verbs that change the “way or aspect” of the verb they accompany.
For example, in the “Present perfect”I can’t say: I have n’t been can to call you. Yes I can say: I haven’t been able to call you. I couldn’t call you.
5. How to use “be able (to)” It is important to remember that to correctly use “be able” you must CONJUGATE the verb “to be” and leave “able” always the same because, as I have said above, it is an adjective that never changes. Therefore, if you know howconjugate the verb “to be” n or cost you anythinguse properly “be able” , but ifdo not know conjugating, all will be problems. Tip: To correctly use “be able” you must first learn to conjugate the verb “to be”. Fí Jate also behind “able” we put the verb in infi nit ivo with ”
Note: We will go from Spanish to English, and not vice versa, so that you can check if you know the correspondence between both languages.
- I wasnot able to enter. I wasn’t able to go in (enter).
O bservations : “Fui” is the past tense of the verb “to be” first person, therefore, I need to put the “to be” in “Past tense” for the first person, that is: “was”. Since it is also negative, then it was “wasn’t”. Then I add “able” which always goes the same.
So: I wasn’t able- I wasn’t able.
- They will not be able toThey won’t be able to come.
Observations : “May” is the future of “power”. You already know that the future in English is made with “will”. As I said above, I cannot use “can” or “could” for the future, therefore I have to resort to the “be able” structure .
How is the “to be” conjugated in the future?
- I will be. I will be
- You will be. You will
- He / She / It will be. Will be
- ….
And in negative?
It is “will not”, but we normally use “won’t”.
So,
- I won’t be. I will not be.
- You won’t be. You will not be.
- He / She / It won’t be . Will not be.
Therefore, “they will not be able ” = “They won’t be able “.
Another example:
- He is ableto lie. He is able to lie.
Observations: “Es” is the present tense of the verb ” ser ” third person. In English, “es” is equivalent to “is”. So “He is able …”
Another example:
- They had not been able toThey hadn’t been able to sleep.
O bservations: “They had not been able ” is equivalent in English to ” Past Perfect” which is formed with “had + the past
participle of the primary verb “.
In this case, the main verb is “to be” and is negative. Therefore, “they could not” is “They hadn’t been able “.
Another example:
- Are they going to be ableto open the door? Are they go ing to be able to open the door?
Observations : ” Van a ” is equivalent in English to “going to”. Therefore, “they are going to be able”. As a question, I have to alter the order of the verb “to be” and put it at the beginning . I must therefore say : Are they going to be able …?
6. What do you have to remember about “be able”?
- Which means “to be able to”.
- Which is obligatorily used when n i”can” or “could ” can be used.
- That I know what is conjugated is the verb “to be” and “able” always remains the same.
- That the verb that follows “able ” goes in fi nitive with “to”: I was able TO work.
- That in order to use “be able” you must first know how to conjugate the verb “to be” in all its tenses.
