Re: TRANS: a child's exercise

andrew <hobbit@...> wrote:

> Question I forgot to ask: Because the TRANS was written by a 10-year-ol=
d I
> deliberately translated it without using the past definite tense.  So I
> want to put a question to the Romanophones on this list; would this be
> normal?  Or would it be expected that a pupil in their 4th or 5th year =
at
> school would know how to use the past definite (or historic) tense in
> their written work?
What do you mean by 'past definite'? I'll try to guess...
Spanish has two pasts, _pret=E9rito indefinido_ and _pret=E9rito imperfec=
to_.
I guess your 'past definite' is the _indefinido_, in spite of the name:

        pret. indefinido: _fuimos de viaje_ 'we went on a trip'
        pret. imperfecto: _=EDbamos de viaje_ 'we were (going) on a trip'

If that's the meaning of your past definite, then I would say no,
in principle. Spanish-speaking children know the difference and use
what fits best. What past did you use in Brithenig? I guess the=20
imperfect one, right? In any case, how you use it depends on the=20
idiosyncracies of Brithenig speakers. In Spanish at least, using
_=EDbamos de viaje_ for the completed action instead of _fuimos de
viaje_ would be very strange even for a child.

Something a child *could* do is to use present tense for everything
when telling a story (just as in English and I'm sure many other langs),
except for the first sentences while s/he sets the scenario.
I haven't done that in Drasel=E9q... I'll have to think about it.


--Pablo Flores
  http://draseleq.conlang.org/pablo-david/