Past Tense and Past Continuous Tense

Simple Past Tense

Simple past tense shows that an activity or situation began and anded at a particular time in the past. It is used :

-    To express a completed action in the past.

-    To express a series of completed actions.

-    To show duration in the past.

-    To show habbits in the past.

-    To describe past facts or generalizations which are no longer true.

A. Nominal

(+)   S + Be (was/were) + C

(-)    S + Be (was/were) + not + C

(?)   Be (was/were) + S + C + ?

Example

(+)  I was a teacher.

(-)  I was not a teacher.

(?)  Was you a teacher?

          Yes, I was.

          No, I wasn’t

B.  Verbal

(+)  S + V₂ + O/C

(-)  S + did + not + V₁ + O/C

(?)  Did + S + V₁ + O/C + ?

Example

(+)  Chilla bought a book last night.

(-)  Chilla didn’t buy a book last night.

(?)  Did she buy a book last night?

      Yes, she did

      No, she didn’t

Past Continuous Tense

A.   To talk about an action which was in progress at certain time in the past.

B.    To talk about two actions that occurred at the same time. On action began earlier and was in progress when the other action occurred.

C.    To talk  about two long actions that were in progress simultaneously.

(+)  S + was/were + V_ing + O/C

(-)  S + was/were + not + V_ing + O/C

(?)  was/were +S + V_ing + O/C + ?

Example

(+)  Tika was reading a novel

(-)   Tika wasn’t reading a novel.

(?)   Was she reading a novel?