Past Tenses

🚂 The Time Travel Train: Mastering Past Tenses

Imagine you have a magical train that travels backward in time. Every time you want to talk about something that already happened, you hop on this train. But here’s the fun part—there are different carriages for different kinds of past stories!

🎯 What You’ll Learn

Today, we’re exploring six amazing ways to talk about the past:

1. Simple Past Form
2. Simple Past Uses
3. Past Continuous Form
4. Past Continuous Uses
5. Used to & Would
6. Be used to & Get used to

Let’s board our Time Travel Train! 🚃

🎫 Carriage 1: Simple Past Form

What Is It?

The Simple Past is like taking a quick photo of something that happened before. Click! It’s done. It’s finished. It’s in the past.

How Do We Make It?

Regular Verbs: Add -ed to the verb.

Spelling Rules:

• Verb ends in -e? Just add -d: live → lived
• Verb ends in consonant + y? Change y to i, add -ed: cry → cried
• Short verb ends in consonant-vowel-consonant? Double the last letter: stop → stopped

Irregular Verbs: These are the rebels! They don’t follow rules.

Negative Form

Use did not (didn’t) + base verb.

✅ I didn’t eat breakfast. ✅ She didn’t go to school.

Question Form

Use Did + subject + base verb?

✅ Did you see the movie? ✅ Did he finish his homework?

🎫 Carriage 2: Simple Past Uses

When Do We Use It?

Think of Simple Past as your “finished story” tense. Use it when:

1️⃣ Completed Actions

Something happened and finished at a specific time.

🕐 I ate pizza yesterday. 🕐 We visited grandma last week.

2️⃣ A Series of Completed Actions

Like telling a story step by step!

📖 I woke up, brushed my teeth, and ate breakfast.

Notice: Each action is done. Finished. Next!

3️⃣ Past Facts or Generalizations

Things that were true in the past.

🦖 Dinosaurs lived millions of years ago. 👴 My grandfather worked as a farmer.

4️⃣ Past Habits (with time expression)

Things you did regularly in the past.

📚 When I was young, I played outside every day.

Time Signal Words

These words are your clues that Simple Past is needed:

• yesterday
• last week/month/year
• ago (two days ago)
• in 2010
• when I was young

🎫 Carriage 3: Past Continuous Form

What Is It?

Past Continuous is like a video instead of a photo! It shows an action that was happening at a specific moment in the past. The action was in progress—not finished yet.

How Do We Make It?

was/were + verb-ing

Examples

🎬 I was sleeping at 10 PM last night. 🎬 They were dancing at the party.

Negative Form

❌ I was not (wasn’t) studying. ❌ We were not (weren’t) watching TV.

Question Form

❓ Was she reading a book? ❓ Were they playing football?

🎫 Carriage 4: Past Continuous Uses

When Do We Use It?

1️⃣ Background Action (Setting the Scene)

Imagine you’re painting a picture of what was happening.

🌅 The sun was shining. Birds were singing. It was a beautiful day.

2️⃣ Interrupted Action

An ongoing action was stopped by another action.

⚡ I was cooking dinner when the phone rang. ⚡ She was walking home when it started to rain.

Notice: The longer action uses Past Continuous. The interruption uses Simple Past.

graph TD
    A["Long Action: was cooking"] --> B["Interruption: phone rang"]
    B --> C["Action stopped or continued"]

3️⃣ Parallel Actions

Two things happening at the same time.

👨‍👩‍👧 Dad was reading while Mom was cooking. 🎮 I was playing games while my sister was doing homework.

Both actions used “while” to connect them.

4️⃣ Specific Time in Progress

What was happening at an exact moment?

🕐 At 8 PM, I was watching a movie. 🕐 At midnight, everyone was sleeping.

🎫 Carriage 5: Used to & Would

What Is “Used to”?

Used to is your “old habits machine”! It talks about things that happened regularly in the past but don’t happen anymore.

Form

used to + base verb

👶 I used to cry a lot when I was a baby. 🏫 She used to walk to school.

Negative

didn’t use to (no -d!)

❌ I didn’t use to like vegetables. ❌ He didn’t use to wake up early.

Question

Did + subject + use to (no -d!)

❓ Did you use to play with dolls? ❓ Did she use to live here?

What Is “Would”?

Would is the cousin of “used to”! It also talks about repeated past actions.

🏖️ Every summer, we would go to the beach. 🍪 Grandma would bake cookies every Sunday.

🚨 Important Difference!

Would CANNOT describe past states!

✅ I used to live in London. (state) ❌ I would live in London. (WRONG!)

✅ She used to have long hair. (state) ❌ She would have long hair. (WRONG!)

Would ONLY works for repeated actions:

✅ I would visit my grandma every weekend. (action) ✅ He would always bring flowers. (action)

🎫 Carriage 6: Be Used to & Get Used to

What Is “Be Used to”?

This means you are comfortable with something. It’s normal for you now!

Form

am/is/are/was/were + used to + noun/verb-ing

🌞 I am used to waking up early. 🌧️ She is used to the cold weather. 📚 They are used to hard work.

It means: “This is normal for me now.”

What Is “Get Used to”?

This means you are becoming comfortable with something. You’re in the process of adjusting!

Form

get/got/getting + used to + noun/verb-ing

🆕 I am getting used to my new school. 🍣 He got used to eating sushi. 💻 She is getting used to working from home.

It means: “I’m adjusting. It’s becoming normal.”

🎯 Quick Comparison

🎓 Your Time Travel Summary

graph TD
    A["Past Tenses"] --> B["Simple Past"]
    A --> C["Past Continuous"]
    A --> D["Used to / Would"]
    A --> E["Be/Get Used to"]

    B --> B1["Finished actions"]
    C --> C1["Actions in progress"]
    D --> D1["Old habits"]
    E --> E1["Comfort level"]

🌟 Remember This!

🚀 You Did It!

You’ve traveled through all six carriages of our Time Travel Train! Now you can:

• ✅ Talk about finished actions (Simple Past)
• ✅ Describe ongoing past moments (Past Continuous)
• ✅ Share old habits (Used to / Would)
• ✅ Express your comfort level (Be/Get used to)

The past is your playground now! 🎉