Simple and Continuous: Form

Let's continue by reviewing how to form the simple past tense and the past continuous tense in Standard English. Next, we will look at when to use each to correctly express our thoughts in a sentence.

Past Tense Form: Simple and Continuous Aspects

In this part of Unit 1, we look at how we form and use the past. The simple past tense is also one of the most common tenses in English. As we did in the previous lesson, keeping in mind parts of speech, sentence structure, and verb mood can help you form and use tenses correctly.

Forming the Simple Past Tense

Again, we want to remember from ESL001 that each sentence in English has a subject and predicate. Also, subject pronouns will help us conjugate the verbs or change their form. Finally, it is also helpful to keep in mind regular and irregular verb types when forming the simple past.

Simple Past Tense - Affirmative

For most verbs (regular), the simple past is conjugated by adding -ed or -d. The basic pattern is Subject + verb(-ed/-d). For irregular verbs, we must learn the changed form of the verb that shows the past. Here are the rules with examples using the regular verb "cook" and irregular verb "sing".

Subject

Verb Conjugation/Form

Sentence Examples

(first person singular)

regular verb+ -ed (or -d)

irregular verb = past form

I cooked pasta yesterday.

I sang alone last night.

you

(second person singular)

regular verb+ -ed (or -d)

irregular verb = past form

You cooked pasta yesterday.

You sang alone last night.

he/she/it

(third person singular)

regular verb+ -ed (or -d)

irregular verb = past form

He cooked pasta yesterday.

She sang alone last night.

(first person plural)

regular verb+ -ed (or -d)

irregular verb = past form

We cooked pasta yesterday.

We sang alone last night.

you

(second person plural)

regular verb+ -ed (or -d)

irregular verb = past form

You cooked pasta yesterday.

You sang alone last night.

they

(third person plural)

regular verb+ -ed (or -d)

irregular verb = past form

They cooked pasta yesterday.

They sang alone last night.

As you can see, the form of the verb is the same for all subjects. Past simple conjugation is easy because we do not have to remember different endings for each person. However, we must remember the past simple form of irregular verbs. Here is a list of the most commonly used irregular verbs.

Simple Present	Past
be	was, were
become	became
begin	began
blow	blew
break	broke
bring	bought
build	built
burst	burst
buy	bought
catch	caught
choose	chose
come	came
cut	cut
dive	dove (dived)
do	did
draw	drew
drink	drank
drive	drove
eat	ate
find	found
fly	flew
forget	forgot
forgive	forgave
freeze	froze
get	got
give	gave
go	went
grow	grew
have	had
hear	heard
hide	hid
hold	held
hurt	hurt
lose	lost
make	made
mean	meant
meet	met
pay	paid
put	put
quit	quit
read	read
ride	rode
ring	rang
rise	rose
run	run
say	said
see	saw
seek	sought
sell	sold
send	sent
set	set
shake	shook
sleep	slept
speak	spoke
spend	spent
spring	sprang
stand	stood
steal	stole
strike	struck
swim	swam
swing	swung
take	took
teach	taught
tear	tore
tell	told
think	thought

Simple Past Tense - Negative

The helping verb "did" is needed to form negative statements in the past simple. It’s very important to note that the verb no longer ends with -ed (for regular types) or uses the past simple form (for irregular types) in the negative. The basic pattern is Subject + did + not + verb. Here are the rules with examples using the regular verb "cook" and irregular verb "sing".

Subject

Verb Conjugation/Form

Sentence Examples

(first person singular)