新課標小學英語國際音標入門：try的用法

　　Today’s tip is on the difference in meaning between “try to do something” and “try doing something”.

　　

　　今天的小貼士是“嘗試做某事”和“嘗試做某事”之間的意思上的不同。

　　

　　“try” plus an infinitive, that is, “to” plus a verb, such as “try to learn” “try to open” “try to read” means to make an effort to do it. “try” plus a gerund, that is, verb-ing, such as “try opening”, “try turning on”, “try giving” means to experiment with a new or different approach to see if it works.

　　

　　“嘗試”加上一個不定式，即“到”加一個動詞，如“試著學習”、“試著打開”、“試著讀”，意思是努力去做。“嘗試”加一個動名詞，是動詞，如“看看”、“把”、“讓”的意思是嘗試一種新的或不同的看看它的方法。

　　

　　Let’s look at some exams. “I’m trying to learn Taiwanese.” This means I’m making an effort to do it. I’m taking a Taiwanese class, doing my homework and speaking in Taiwanese whenever I can. Here’s another exam. “I tried to open the window.” This sentence means I pulled the window up, but it did not go up, so I pushed the window up, but it still did not open. I made an effort to open the window, but I could not open it. On the other hand, “I tried opening the window” means that I did open the window and that I opened it for a reason. I was hot and I wanted to cool off. I tried opening the window, but that didn’t help. So I tried turning on the fan, but I was still hot. So I tried taking off some of my clothes, but that didn’t work either. Finally, I turned on the air conditioner, and that finally succeeded in helping me cool off. I experimented with many things to see what would work.

　　

　　讓我們看一些例子。“我在試著學臺語”，這意味著我正在努力做這件事。我要上臺語課，做作業(yè)，盡可能用臺語講話。這是另一個例子。“我試著打開窗戶”，這句話的意思是我把窗戶拉上來，但沒有上升，所以我把窗戶推了上去，但它仍然沒有打開。我努力打開窗戶，但我打不開。另一方面，“我試著打開窗戶”意味著我打開了窗戶，我打開它是有原因的。我很熱，我想涼快一下。我試著打開窗戶，但那沒有用。所以我試著打開風扇，但是我還是熱的。所以我試著脫下我的一些衣服，但那也不起作用。 后，我打開空調，終于成功地幫我降溫了。我嘗試了很多東西，看看會有什么效果。

　　

　　So remember, “try to do something” is to make an effort, and “try doing something” is to experiment with different way to achieve your purpose.

　　

　　所以記住，“嘗試做某事”就是努力，而“嘗試做某事”就是用不同的方法來達到你的目的。