[mteach]

An exercise that almost always clarifies the difference between past simple and present perfect is a simple sentence matching activity. Choose 2 famous actors, authors, and artists that are well known by your students. One person in each category must be alive, and one deceased. For example: actresses - Marilyn Monroe and Julia Roberts. Write a sentence that can be applied to both of them, but obviously with different tenses. I use:

"She was one of the world's most famous actresses for many years."
"She has been one of the world's most famous actresses for many years."

The students usually have no problem matching up the sentences to the correct category, but when they have to pick the difference between Marilyn's sentence and Julia's sentence, they struggle. This is a great opportunity to point out the completed action (Marilyn is dead and can no longer act) and the continued action (Julia is alive and still a famous actress - she was 10 years ago and continues to be today). This is simple to set up and very clear to the students. They always get it.