Lesson Twelve

The Past Tense

There are two types of past tense verbs:

regular verbs: add “ed” to the simple form

irregular verbs: don’t add “ed”

Regular Verbs		Irregular Verbs
simple	past	simple	past
work	worked	be	was/were
live	lived	get	got
move	moved	go	went
walk	walked	put	put
open	opened	eat	ate
wait	waited	have	had

Remember to write in your notebook.

Regular verbs add ed to make the past tense (work / worked) and irregular verbs change their form entirely (go / went), or they don’t change at all (put / put). The most important verb to learn first in the past tense is “be.”

Be – Past Tense

Singular	Plural
I was	We were
You were	You were
He was	They were
She was
It was

I was at school yesterday.

We were in New York last week.

It was cold this morning.

Now, watch this video:

Only the verb “be” changes its form for the singular or plural. All the other verbs, regular and irregular, use one form in the past tense, which makes the past tense a little easier to use when making statements.

More practice with this important verb (“be”) comes in Lesson 16.

Regular Verb: Learn

Subject + _____ed

Singular	Plural
I learned	We learned
You learned	You learned
He learned	They learned
She learned
It learned

To make the negative, use “did” + “not” (didn’t) + the main verb in the simple form:
Singular	Plural
I did not learn	We did not learn
You did not learn	You did not learn
He did not learn	They did not learn
She did not learn
It did not learn

Irregular Verb: Have

Subject + ________

(irregular verbs take many different forms in the past tense)

Singular	Plural
I had	We had
You had	You had
He had	They had
She had
It had

Irregular verbs must be memorized because they change their form completely. Click here for a list of commonly used irregular verbs, print it out, and commit them to memory.

Review:

The Past Tense describes the things you did yesterday, last year, back in February, in 1973, or an hour ago.

Regular verbs, such as learn, take an “ed” ending after the subject.

work—worked

learn—learned

visit—visited

Irregular verbs change their form entirely or not at all.

eat—ate

go—went

be—was/were

hit—hit

cut—cut

The form of the past tense is not dependent on the subject. See the example below:

Regular Verb – work: I worked yesterday. Irregular Verb – eat: I ate breakfast earlier.	I

Regular Verb – work: You worked yesterday. Irregular Verb – eat: You ate breakfast earlier.	you

Regular Verb – work: He worked yesterday. Irregular Verb – ate: He ate breakfast earlier.	he

Regular Verb – work: She worked yesterday. Irregular Verb – ate: She ate lunch an hour ago.	she

Regular Verb – like: The cat liked her food. Irregular Verb –eat: She ate her food.	it

Regular Verb – arrive: We arrived on time. Irregular Verb – be: We were on time.	I + you = we

Regular Verb – share: You shared a milkshake. Irregular Verb – have: You had a nice lunch.	you

Regular Verb – visit: They visited the beach. Irregular Verb – go / eat: They went to the beach and ate popsicles.	they