Presented by

Karen Inchy

Function

• Indicates an action or series of actions that began and ended at a particular time in the past.

e.g. He walked to the beach yesterday.

• Often used for narrative.

Regular Form

• Positive: add -ed to the base form of the verb.

e.g. jump – jumped

Difficulty: spelling

Spelling Rules

• If the verb ends in an -e, only add -d.

e.g. live – lived

• If the verb ends in a consonant + -y, change the -y to -i and add -ed.

e.g. study – studied

• If the verb ends in a vowel + -y, just add -ed.

e.g. play – played

• If the verb ends in consonant - vowel -consonant, double the last consonant.

e.g. stop – stopped

exception: visit - visited

Pronunciation

Difficulty: The past -ed is pronounced in

3 ways.

If the last letter of the base verb is:

• Unvoiced: /t/ - worked, watched

• Voiced: /d/ - loved, cleaned

• Verb ends in d or t: /id/ - wanted, added

• Negative: Add did not before the base form of the verb.e.g. He did not pass his driving test.

• Contraction: didn’t

Difficulty: when forming the negative pupils may continue to add -ed to the base form of the verb.e.g. He didn’t passed his driving test.

• Questions: Begin with did and the verb stays in the base form.

e.g. Did he go to college?

Difficulty: pupils may use the past form of the verb instead of the base form.

e.g. Did he went to college?

Irregular Verbs

Difficulty: irregular verbs:

• Do not take -ed

• Have to be learned.

e.g. teach – taught

run – ran

put – put

know – knew

To Be• The verb to be is irregular:

I/ he/ she/ it - waswe/ you/ they - were

Difficulty: The verb to be (the copula) is idiosyncratic (no Hebrew equivalent) and has a multiplicity of forms (2 forms). Regular past simple verbs only have one form.

• Negative: I/ he/ she/ it - was notwe/ you/ they - were not

• Contractions: wasn’t / weren’t

• Questions: begin with was or were and then the subject (inversion).e.g. Was she here?

Were they here?

Difficulty: pupils may use did plus was or were to form questions.e.g. Did she was here?

Time Expressions

• yesterday

• last (week, month, year)

• a long time ago, two days ago

• in 1987

• in the 1960s

• when I was a child

Bibliography

• Azar, B. (1998) Understanding and using English Grammar

• Celce-Murcia (1999) The Grammar Book

• Zelenko, E. (1994) Develop Your Grammar

• About:http://esl.about.com/library/grammar/blpastsimple.htm

• http://www.learnwithlucy.com/stregpt.htm