About english and grammar

My friend thought that we could create a thread about english and grammar (in case someone didn't know, we are from Finland). She hasn't found such. This thread doesn't need to be only for us. Of course others can also discuss about it here. :thumbup: My friend thought that people could discuss generally about english and grammar in this thread. So, are others also interested in discussing about this topic? She thought that she would start by asking about this:

My friend has seen tv shows where they safe animals. After that they often say in those shows that they are going to take those animals back wherever they are going to take them. My friend has wondered for a long time why do they say that they are going to take those animals back although they have never been in that place before. So, does anyone know why do they say so?

I'm an English teacher in the United States, so this is always interesting to me : )

To answer your question, since the people are taking a dog with them to the place the people had just come from, it is grammatically correct to say they are taking the dog BACK with them. A less confusing way to think about it would be if they said "we just came from the humane society. We are getting ready to go back and are bringing the dog with us."

Yes, like the poster before said, although the animal has never been at the headquarters, the police or people doing the saving have been. So back, refers to where the people are going, and the animals are coming along with them. Back is the location in the sentence.

Just like you could say "we are bringing the animals to the veterinarian with us", you could say "we are bringing the animals back with us".

My friend would like to ask also about two other things:

1) When and when not to use that? She means when it's not used as a pronoun. We have different opinions on when to use it. My friend argues I "might put it almost everywhere" whereas she thinks it would look silly if one put that where it doesn't belong. So, do you know where we could find information about it? My friend has tried to search.

2) When to use continues tenses. My friend's grammar book says that you use them if something is happening currently or doing something takes a long time. My friend thinks that I "wouldn't know how to" use them by myself although she has told me about that. Or at least it seems like it I wouldn't. So, could you tell more about it? The other question is why are you using them. Why do you say for example running and not just run?