The conditional that keeps coming back
During a mock PAU writing task, a 17-year-old student produces these sentences: (1) 'If the town council would have installed more recycling bins, the beach would be cleaner now.' (2) 'The neighbours which complained last summer are happy with the new schedule.' (3) 'I am living in this neighbourhood since 2015.' (4) 'Despite of the noise, I like it here.' The teacher has 15 minutes of class time and wants to prioritise errors that cost most marks in the grammar-and-accuracy criterion. The student can explain the rule for (2) when asked but repeats the same error in new writing. He asks whether 'would have' is always wrong in if-clauses. The class has already covered conditionals twice, relative clauses once, and present perfect continuous once. The exam is in nine days.
1. Correct all four sentences and explain the rule behind each correction.
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'If the town council had installed more recycling bins, the beach would be cleaner now.' This is a mixed conditional: a hypothetical past cause with a present result. Standard English does not use 'would have' in the if-clause. The if-clause takes the past perfect; the result clause takes 'would' + infinitive when the result is present.
'The neighbours who complained last summer are happy with the new schedule.' In a defining relative clause, 'which' does not refer to people. Use 'who' or 'that'. The comma test matters: no comma means the clause identifies which neighbours, so 'who' is the natural choice.
'I have been living in this neighbourhood since 2015.' The action started in the past and continues now, so English uses the present perfect continuous, not the present continuous. 'Since' takes a point in time; 'for' would take a duration.
'Despite the noise, I like it here.' 'Despite' is followed directly by a noun or -ing form. 'Despite of' is not standard; the two-word form is 'in spite of'. This is a quick lexical fix, not a conceptual one.
2. Prioritise the four errors for a 15-minute session and justify the order using what you know about the student and the exam.
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Priority 1: the mixed conditional (1). It has already been taught twice and still appears in new writing, so it is fossilised. It is also high-frequency in opinion essays about past decisions and present consequences. The student's question shows he has a rule but has over-generalised it, so the session should contrast 'If I had known, I would have applied' with 'If I had known, I would be happier now'.
Priority 2: present perfect with 'since' (3). Personal writing constantly requires this structure, and the error is easy to see in a final check. Five minutes of oral transformation practice, then a self-edit instruction: 'Circle every since/for and check the tense.'
Priority 3: 'Despite of' (4). A 30-second correction with two examples is enough. It is a lexicalised error, not a system error.
Priority 4: 'which' for people (2). He can already explain it, so more explanation has low returns. A one-line reminder and a check during editing is sufficient.
Order: conceptual and fossilised first; quick lexical fixes second; already-known rules last.
3. The student can explain the relative-clause rule but repeats the error. What does this tell the teacher, and what should change in the feedback?
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It shows declarative knowledge without procedural control: he knows the rule when he is asked to state it, but he does not apply it while composing. More explanation will not help. The feedback should move from 'here is the rule again' to 'notice, correct, and produce under time pressure'.
Concrete change: after the next writing task, give him a marking code rather than corrections. Mark relative-clause errors with 'RC' and ask him to find and fix them himself. Then ask him to write three new sentences about his neighbourhood using 'who' and 'which' correctly. Finally, include one relative clause in a five-minute timed paragraph. The aim is to make the correct form available while he is thinking about content, which is the condition the exam creates.