verb tenses: past simple and past continuous

1. Past Simple and Past Continuous
Pepa Mut

2. Form
• Past simple:
I worked
I didn’t work
Did you work?
-ed spelling:
Loved, stopped, planned,
studied, played
• Past continuous:
I was working
I wasn’t working
Were you working?
-ing spelling:
Dancing, planning,
studying, playing,
lying (lie)

3. Use 1: Used separately
• One short action
happens after another.
She knocked on the door
and came in.
• Two long actions
happen at the same
time.
She was doing her
homework while her
brother was playing on
the computer.

4. Use 2: Both tenses together
• Past simple: new action that interrupts another action
• Past continuous: an action already in progress.
While I was sitting in a meeting my mobile suddenly rang.

5. Use 3: Emphasis on time
• Past Simple: just to
mention something that
happened in the past.
We went to the movies last
Sunday.
• Past Continuous: to
emphasize progress and
that an action was taking
place at a specific time.
We were watching TV at
eight this morning.

6. The following verbs are usually only used in Simple Past
(not in the progressive form).
-state: be, cost, fit, mean (They were on holiday.)
-possession: belong, have (I had a cat.)
-senses: feel, hear, see, smell, taste, touch (He felt the cold.)
-feelings: hate, hope, like, love, prefer, want (I loved pizza)
-brain work: believe, know, understand (I didn’t understand)
They had a dog.

7. Time expressions
I was going down when I fell off the stairs.
While we were shopping Susan was talking on the
phone.
We were having dinner when the bell rang.
While she was washing the dishes, he was ironing.