When speaking English as a second language, it's often difficult to decide how to answer a question.
Begin by thinking about "when", or the time frame which the sentence is referring to.
The easy way to do this is to look at the tense of the question--like this:
A: What did you do today?
B: I bought socks.
The questioner using the helping verb did, which tells us the question is about the past, so the answer should be in the past, too. Thus the answerer uses the simple past form of buy. Here, a girl and her father are in a restaurant. The girl is watching a waiter and asks about her. Daughter: What is she doing--the waiter? The girl is asking about what's happening now. Father: She taking the man's order. So the father answers in the same style--the tense of the daughter's question.... Daughter: That's her job? So the father answers in the that same tense: Father: Yes it is--and bringing the food. Now the daughter switches to the present Simple--asking about usual activity: Daughter: She takes order and brings food all the time? Father: Yes. Daughter: What's she doing now? Father: She's going to the kitchen, now.日本語訳
第二言語として英語を話すときは、質問にどう答えるか迷うことがあります。まず「いつのことか」を考え、質問の時制を見ましょう。A「今日は何をしたの？」B「靴下を買った」。did と尋ねられているので、buy の過去形 bought で答えます。次はレストランで、女の子が父親に給仕の仕事を尋ねる会話です。「彼女は今、何をしているの？」「男性の注文を聞いている」「それが仕事？」「そうだよ、料理も運ぶ」「いつも注文を聞いて料理を運ぶの？」「そうだよ」「今は何をしているの？」「今、厨房へ向かっているよ」。
解答・解説の日本語訳
起きている最中のことには現在進行形、いつもする仕事には現在形、過去のことには過去形で答える、というのが本文のポイントです。元の英語の会話には She taking ... など不自然な形があるため、学習上の編集確認事項に残し、英語本文は変更しません。