Simple Past Tense

Simple Past: Regular Verbs

Introduction

The simple past tense is one of the most common tenses in English. Its form is the same with all subjects. It is usually formed by adding -ED to the verb. This page will explain the rules for forming the tense with regular verbs.

The past tense is a grammatical tense whose principal function is to place an action or situation in past time. In languages which have a past tense, it thus provides a grammatical means of indicating that the event being referred to took place in the past. Examples of verbs in the past tense include the English verbs sang, went and was.

In some languages, the grammatical expression of past tense is combined with the expression of other categories such as mood and aspect (see tense–aspect–mood). Thus a language may have several types of past tense form, their use depending on what aspectual or other additional information is to be encoded. French, for example, has a compound past (passé composé) for expressing completed events, an imperfect for expressing events which were ongoing or repeated in the past, as well as several other past forms.

Some languages that grammaticalise for past tense do so by inflecting the verb, while others do so periphrastically using auxiliary verbs, also known as "verbal operators" (and some do both, as in the example of French given above). Not all languages grammaticalise verbs for past tense – Mandarin Chinese, for example, mainly uses lexical means (words like "yesterday" or "last week") to indicate that something took place in the past, although use can also be made of the tense/aspect markers le and guo.

The "past time" to which the past tense refers generally means the past relative to the moment of speaking, although in contexts where relative tense is employed (as in some instances ofindirect speech) it may mean the past relative to some other time being under discussion.^[1] A language's past tense may also have other uses besides referring to past time; for example, in English and certain other languages, the past tense is sometimes used in referring to hypothetical situations, such as in condition clauses like If you loved me ..., where the past tense loved is used even though there may be no connection with past time.

Some languages grammatically distinguish the recent past from remote past with separate tenses. There may be more than two distinctions.

A general past tense can be indicated with the glossing abbreviation pst.

1. Forming the simple past tense

With most verbs, the simple past is created simply by adding -ED. However, with some verbs, you need to add -D or change the ending a little. Here are the rules:

Verb ending in...	How to make the simple past	Examples
e	Add -D	live  lived date  dated
Consonant +y	Change y to i, then add -ED	try  tried cry  cried
One vowel + one consonant (but NOT w or y)	Double the consonant, then add -ED	tap  tapped commit  committed
anything else including w	Add -ED	boil  boiled fill  filled hand  handed show  showed

Simple Past: Irregular Verbs

Introduction

Although many verbs in English form their past tense with -ED, some do not. These are called irregular verbs, and they include some of the most basic verbs in English. This page will explain some of the most important patterns in forming the past tense. However, the only way to know how an irregular verb will change in the past tense is to learn all of the important verbs.

1. The three most important irregular verbs

The three most important irregular verbs are BE, HAVE, and DO. The simple past forms for BE are different depending on the subject.

Pronoun	BE	HAVE	DO
I	was	had	did
You	were	had	did
He / she / it	was	had	did
We	were	had	did
They	were	had	did

2. Other irregular verbs

Other irregular verbs fall into three main categories:

Category	Examples
Verbs which don't change	cut - cut hit - hit fit - fit
Verbs which change their vowel	get - got sit - sat drink - drank
Verbs which change completely	catch - caught bring - brought teach - taught

FORM

[VERB+ed] or irregular verbs

Examples:

·       You called Debbie.

·       Did you call Debbie?

·       You did not call Debbie.

Complete List of Simple Past Forms

USE 1 Completed Action in the Past

Use the Simple Past to express the idea that an action started and finished at a specific time in the past. Sometimes, the speaker may not actually mention the specific time, but they do have one specific time in mind.

Examples:

·       I saw a movie yesterday.

·       I didn't see a play yesterday.

·       Last year, I traveled to Japan.

·       Last year, I didn't travel to Korea.

·       Did you have dinner last night?

·       She washed her car.

·       He didn't wash his car.

USE 2 A Series of Completed Actions

We use the Simple Past to list a series of completed actions in the past. These actions happen 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and so on.

Examples:

·       I finished work, walked to the beach, and found a nice place to swim.

·       He arrived from the airport at 8:00, checked into the hotel at 9:00, and met the others at 10:00.

·       Did you add flour, pour in the milk, and then add the eggs?

USE 3 Duration in Past

The Simple Past can be used with a duration which starts and stops in the past. A duration is a longer action often indicated by expressions such as: for two years, for five minutes, all day, all year, etc.

Examples:

·       I lived in Brazil for two years.

·       Shauna studied Japanese for five years.

·       They sat at the beach all day.

·       They did not stay at the party the entire time.

·       We talked on the phone for thirty minutes.

·       A: How long did you wait for them?
B: We waited for one hour.

USE 4 Habits in the Past

The Simple Past can also be used to describe a habit which stopped in the past. It can have the same meaning as "used to." To make it clear that we are talking about a habit, we often add expressions such as: always, often, usually, never, when I was a child, when I was younger, etc.

Examples:

·       I studied French when I was a child.

·       He played the violin.

·       He didn't play the piano.

·       Did you play a musical instrument when you were a kid?

·       She worked at the movie theater after school.

·       They never went to school, they always skipped class.

USE 5 Past Facts or Generalizations

The Simple Past can also be used to describe past facts or generalizations which are no longer true. As in USE 4 above, this use of the Simple Past is quite similar to the expression "used to."

Examples:

·       She was shy as a child, but now she is very outgoing.

·       He didn't like tomatoes before.

·       Did you live in Texas when you were a kid?

·       People paid much more to make cell phone calls in the past.

IMPORTANT When-Clauses Happen First

Clauses are groups of words which have meaning but are often not complete sentences. Some clauses begin with the word "when" such as "when I dropped my pen..." or "when class began..." These clauses are called when-clauses, and they are very important. The examples below contain when-clauses.

Examples:

·       When I paid her one dollar, she answered my question.

·       She answered my question when I paid her one dollar.

When-clauses are important because they always happen first when both clauses are in the Simple Past. Both of the examples above mean the same thing: first, I paid her one dollar, and then, she answered my question. It is not important whether "when I paid her one dollar" is at the beginning of the sentence or at the end of the sentence. However, the example below has a different meaning. First, she answered my question, and then, I paid her one dollar.

Example:

·       I paid her one dollar when she answered my question.

ADVERB PLACEMENT

The examples below show the placement for grammar adverbs such as: always, only, never, ever, still, just, etc.

Examples:

·       You just called Debbie.

·       Did you just call Debbie?

ACTIVE / PASSIVE

Examples:

·       Tom repaired the car. Active

·       The car was repaired by Tom. Passive

Referensi:

http://web2.uvcs.uvic.ca/elc/studyzone/330/grammar/pasted.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Past_tense

http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/simplepast.html