Past simple: formation and uses

It’s time now to study the past simple tense. In previous posts, we have study the present simple, the present continous, present perfect and, finally, the present perfect continuous. So it’s the turn now of past tenses and the first one we are going to revise is the past simple. 

First, we will see how we form the past simple tense. Secondly, we will see the formation of the past tense and irregular verbs and, finally, we will see the contexts in which we use this tense. 

 

Formation:

Affirmative: we start the affirmative sentence with the subject followed by the verb in the past tense. Finally we add the complements that we need. Let’s take as example the verb “to want”

VERB TO WANT PAST SIMPLE AFFIRMATIVE
1º person singular	I wanted
2º person singular	You wanted
3º person singular	He/ she/ it wanted
1º person plural	We wanted
2º person plural	You wanted
3º person plural	They wanted

Negative: we start the negative sentence with the subject followed by the auxiliary verb “to do” in past tense. As this verb is irregular, we have to write (or say) “did”. Next, we use the negative particle “not” and then, we write the verb in its infinitive form. To end our sentence, we write the rest of the complements.

VERB TO WANT PAST SIMPLE NEGATIVE
1º person singular	I did not want
2º person singular	You did not want
3º person singular	He/ she/ it did not want
1º person plural	We did not want
2º person plural	You did not want
3º person plural	They did not want

Interrogative: when we want to ask something in the past simple tense, first we have to use the auxiliary verb “to do” in past tense (“did”), then we write the subject followed by the verb in its infinitive form. To end our sentence we write the complements we need.

Remember! Add the interrogation sign at the end of the sentence or it would be grammatically incorrect.

VERB TO WANT PAST SIMPLE INTERROGATIVE
1º person singular	Did I want?
2º person singular	Did you want?
3º person singular	Did He/ she/ it want?
1º person plural	Did we want?
2º person plural	Did you want?
3º person plural	Did they want?

To form the past tense of regular verbs we only have to add –ed at the end of the verb we are using. However, there are some rules to follow:

If the verb ends in…		Example
-e	Only add –d	Live - lived
Consonant + -y	Change –y to –I and then add –ed	Try – tried
Vowel + consonant (not -w or –y)	Double the consonant, then add –ed	Commit  -committed

In the rest of the cases, we only add –ed.

Uses of the past simple:

1. To express the idea that an action started and finished at a specific time in the past. Sometimes, the speaker may not actually mention the specific time, but they do have one specific time in mind

                 I traveled to Japan.

                 I didn’t see a film yesterday.

2. To list a series of completed actions in the past. These actions happen 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and so on.

               I finished work, walked to the beach, and found a nice place to swim.

3. With a duration which starts and stops in the past. Duration is a longer action often indicated by expressions such as: for two years, for five minutes, all day, all year, etc.

             Shauna studied Japanese for five years.

4. used to describe a habit which stopped in the past

             He played the violin when he was a child.

If you want to do some exercises about the present continous, click on the flowing links:

Exercise_01

Exercise_02

Exercise_03