Continuous tenses are also known as progressive tenses. Past continuous tense uses present participle with ‘ing’. The past continuous tense is an important tense used to express action at a particular moment in the past. The action started before that moment but has not finished at that moment.
More uses of Past continuous tense:
- to express an action that took place in past when shorter action happened.
e.g. I was going home when it started raining.
- to express two actions that were going on at the same time in the past using connector ‘while’
e.g. I was reading newspaper while you were having coffee.
- to ask polite questions
e.g. I was wondering if you could come tomorrow.
Rules
- ‘was’ is used with I and singular subjects.
- ‘were’ is used with you, we, they and plural subjects.
Positive form: Subject + was/were + Verb first form with ing + object
Examples:
I was going home.
They were watching a movie.
She was cooking dinner.
You were playing with your friends
Negative form: Subject + was/were + not + Verb first form with ing + object
Examples:
They were not playing football.
She was not coming home.
We were not listening to music.
Tina was not studying.
Interrogative form: Was/were + subject + First form of Verb with ing + object + ?
Examples:
Was she studying for her exams?
Were they not going for dance class?
Were you watching television?
Was Dan cooking dinner?
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