Past Tense

Past Perfect Continuous Tense Examples – All Four Forms

8th June 2020 By Edify English Leave a Comment

In this article various forms of Past Perfect Continuous Tense examples are given to help understand different ways in which the tense is used in real life English communication. Also in the end some sentences are given for your practice.

Past Perfect Continuous Tense
Mary had been working as a nun for 30 years when she passed away in 2015. This shows an action that started in the past and continued for a period of time until some action happened in the past. Past perfect continuous tense, like the past perfect, is used in combination with the simple past tense.

Structure: Subject + Had been + Verb 1 (V1) + Ing + Object

Rahul had been waiting for the bus for half an hour when his friend picked him up.
She had been watching the movie for two hours.
The previous king had been alive when his heir became the new king.
During this time last year, it had been raining for three days continuously.
When I went to college, the lecture had been going on for half an hour already.

Rule: This tense is also used for expressing an action in the past which is repeated many times. For example,

She had been trying to contact you.

Past Perfect Continuous Tense Examples

Like every tense, the past perfect continuous also has four forms through which it can be expressed. The four are as follows:

Positive : Subject + Had been + Verb 1 (V1) + Ing + Object

Positive Interrogative : Had +Subject + been + V1 + ing + Object?

Negative: Subject + Had not been + Verb 1 (V1) + Ing + Object

Negative Interrogative : Had +Subject + not been + V1 + ing + Object?

Look at the following example

She had been trying to contact you – the four forms of the above example can be written as

Positive : She had been trying to contact you.
Positive Interrogative : Had she been trying to contact you?
Negative: She had not been trying to contact you.
Negative Interrogative : Had she not been trying to contact you?

Exercise: Let us take some more examples and write them in all the four forms.

Had she not been aspiring to get a job?
I had not been planning this meeting with you.
She had been writing her first novel when she turned 10.

For remaining Tenses, Click here

Follow us on Facebook

Past Perfect tense Examples – All Four Forms

8th June 2020 By Edify English Leave a Comment

The best way to learn tenses in English Grammar is to know the usage and structure of the tense and then practice different forms of example sentences. In this article we have presented various forms of Past Perfect Tense Examples which help you to understand and remember the tense.

Past Perfect Tense

The past perfect tense describes an action completed at a certain time in the past. (Both singular and plural subjects will be accompanied by ‘had’ in the past perfect tense.)

Structure: Subject + Had + Verb 3 (V3) + Object

Example:

He had written a book when he was 10 years old.

Rule: When two past actions are mentioned in a single sentence, in order to distinguish both of them, the earlier action is described in the past perfect tense and the other action, in the simple past tense.

The train had already left by the time he reached the station.
The movie had already started by the time we entered the theatre.
Martin had called me before he came to my place.
I had deposited the money in the bank when Raj met me to borrow some.

Rule: If there is any unfulfilled wish in the past, it is expressed in the past perfect tense. For example,

She had hoped that I would marry her.
He had waited for her to come, but she didn’t.

Past Perfect Tense Examples

Like every tense, the past perfect tense can also be expressed in has four forms.

Positive : Subject + had + Verb 3 (V3) + Object

Positive Interrogative : Had +Subject + Verb 3 (V3) + Object?

Negative : Subject + had not + Verb 3 (V3) + Object

Negative Interrogative : Had not +Subject + Verb 3 (V3) + Object? (or) Had + Subject + not + V3 + Object

For example, if we take the sentence “He had left for Canada.” The sentence can be written in four forms as follows:

Positive : He had left for Canada.
Positive Interrogative : Had he left for Canada?
Negative : He had not left for Canada.
Negative Interrogative : Hadn’t he left for Canada? (Or) had he not left for Canada?

Exercise: Now, let us take some more examples and write all the four forms of those sentences.

I had written him a letter.
The train had left the station before I reached.
The professor had exited the building before she entered.

For remaining Tenses, Click here

Follow us on Facebook

Past Continuous tense Example Sentences – All Four Forms

7th June 2020 By Edify English Leave a Comment

To understand Tenses in English, the best way is to know how they are actually used in daily communication. This means that, once you learn the usage and structure of a particular tense you need to look at various forms of examples of that tense. In this article, lets look at various forms of Past Continuous Tense Example Sentences.

Structure: Subject + Was/ Were + Verb 1 (V1) + ing + Object

I was watching Soccer on TV last night.Past continuous tense was expressed in sentences containing an action that was happening at some time in the past.

He was working as a teacher during this time last year.
I was visiting London in May last year.

Some more rules:

This tense is used when two actions were simultaneously happening in the past. For example, “While he was doing the dishes, I was preparing lunch”. Here, both the deeds were happening in the past at the same time.
This tense can also be used along with simple past tense. For example, “While I was going to the theater, I saw him on the road.”

Past Continuous tense Example Sentences

Like every tense, the past continuous tense too can be expressed in the following forms

Positive : Subject + was/were + V1 + ing + Object

Positive Interrogative : Was/were + subject + V1 + ing + Object?

Negative : Subject + was/were not + V1 + ing + Object

Negative Interrogative : Was/were not + subject + V1 + ing + Object?

Let us take an example and write it in the above four forms.

Positive : They were watching a film.
Positive Interrogative : Were they watching a film?
Negative : They were not watching a film.
Negative Interrogative : Were they not watching a film?

Exercise: Let’s take some more Past Continuous tense Example Sentences and try to write the four forms of all those.

I was being loud in the classroom.
She wasn’t going to write that poem.
He was waiting for you in the hall before he left.
It was getting darker.

For remaining Tenses, Click here

Follow us on Facebook

Simple Past Tense Example Sentences – All Four Forms

6th June 2020 By Edify English Leave a Comment

In this article four forms of Simple Past Tense example sentences are given which helps to understand how this tenses is used in real-life English communication. But before going into that, it is important to learn the basic structure and rules of simple past tense.

Simple Past Tense

To describe an action that took place at any specific point of time in the past.

Structure : Subject + verb 2 (V2) + Object

Example Sentences:

- He spoke to me an hour ago.
- Virat Kohli scored a century in the last match.
- Narendra Modi became the PM of India in 2014.
- We watched a movie yesterday.
- Long ago, there lived a king.

Simple past tense Example Sentences – All four forms

Like every tense, simple past tense can also be expressed in four different forms based on the situation and context.

Positive : Subject + V2 + Object

Positive Interrogative : Did +Subject + V1 + Object?

Negative : Subject + did not + V1 + Object

Negative Interrogative : Did not + Subject + V1 + Object?

This is different from the simple present tense in the way that the helping verbs used in the simple present tense are “do/does” while the one used in the past tense is ‘did’.

If we take the example “We watched a movie yesterday”, the four forms of the tense are as follows:

Positive: We watched a movie yesterday.
Positive Interrogative: Did we watch a movie yesterday?
Negative: We didn’t watch a movie yesterday.
Negative Interrogative: Didn’t we watch a movie yesterday?

Exercise:

Let us take some more examples of simple past tense and try to write the four forms of those sentences on your own.

She lived a peaceful life.
He cooked food for everyone today.
The river flew across this road.
He didn’t wash his clothes. [This one is a negative sentence, and you need to convert it into positive.
Did you submit the assignment yesterday?

For remaining Tenses, Click here

Follow us on Facebook