VERBS Principal Parts, Simple Tenses, Progressive and Perfect Tenses

• Verbs show action or state of being

1. Fred jumped off the high dive and hit the water with a splash.

(jumped and hit are actions – they are words that name what Fred DID)

2. Now he is tired, but he is proud of his achievement. (is tired; is proud – these express Fred’s state of being – you know, how he is)

• There are four principal parts of a verb. They are the base form, the past, the past participle, and the present participle.

Base Form | Past | Past Participle | Present Participle walk | walked | walked | walking dream | dreamed | dreamed | dreaming * ride | rode | ridden | riding * write | wrote | written | writing

*Be careful with irregular verbs!

*REMEMBER: Participle forms can be part of a verb phrase, function as nouns, or describe as adjectives Voyages page 58

• A verb phrase is two or more words working together to form the simple predicate in a sentence. A verb phrase will have a main verb, and one or more auxiliary (or “helping”) verb.

1. She was walking quickly to the mall.2. Tammy might have eaten the remainder of the cake.

3. Harsh words were spoken.4. Brian’s drumming must have woken everyone in the house.

• The verb forms show a verb’s tense, indicating the time of the action.

• The simple tenses are the present tense, the past tense, and the future tense.

1. Maria sings in the church choir. (present)2. Yesterday, she sang a solo at mass. (past)3. Next week, Maria will sing my favorite hymn. (future)

• Progressive tenses include a being verb and the present participle form of the main verb.

• Use progressive tense to indicate continuing or ongoing action.

1. Laurel is playing basketball. (Present progressive)2. She was playing soccer last year. (Past progressive)3. Laurel will be playing softball in the spring. (Future progressive)

• Perfect tenses consist of a form of the verb to have and the past participle form of the main verb.

• The present perfect tells an action that occurred in an indefinite time in the past and continues in the present:

1. I have read The Hobbit several times.

• The past perfect tells about an action that was completed before another action:

2. I had read a poem by Tolkien as a child.

• The future perfect tells about an action that will be completed before a specific time in the future:

3. I will have read all of his works before my 100th birthday.

Snoopy has been a dog all his life. He had hoped to be a pilot, but this was only a dream.

• Progressive forms of perfect tenses indicate ongoing action

1. Lydia has been baking for days.

2. Frank had been swimming for an hour when the shark approached.

3. By the year 2025, I will have been teaching for over three decades.

Voyages page 68