This document provides exercises to practice using the past continuous tense in English, including forming sentences in the past continuous, making sentences negative, completing sentences with auxiliary verbs, identifying which verb should be past continuous and which should be past simple in sentences, forming questions in the past continuous, and asking and answering questions about highlighted information using the past continuous tense.

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Activity Box Past Continuous Tense
1. Use the words given to form a sentence in the past continuous.
a. We / eat dinner / at six o’clock yesterday
b. They / watch a film / when I phoned
c. Eric and I / jostle for the best places at the concert
d. Pauline / whistle / while / she / walk
e. The wind / blow / across the moors
2. Make the sentences in question one into negative sentences.
3. Complete each of the following sentences using the auxiliary be and the verb in brackets in past
continuous.
a. When Jack phoned, I (have) ________________ a shower.
b. Bill (practise) ________________ the piano when I arrived home.
c. I realised the young boy (drown) ________________, so I jumped into the water to save him.
d. Poor little Marta had such bad toothache. You could tell it hurt because she (wince)
________________ while she (chew) ________________.
e. I (try) ________________ to complete my assignment but the loud construction works (distract)
________________ me.
4. In each of the following sentences, one verb should be in past continuous and the other in past simple.
Complete the sentences.
a. I / trip over / when / I / run down the street
b. Rob / drive / far too fast / when / the police / stop / him
c. I / talk / to my boss / when / you / phone
d. You / not working / when / I / look at / you
e. The barber / accidentally cut / my ear / when / I / have my hair cut
5. Form questions in the past continuous with the words given.
a. John / tidy / his bedroom
b. Alice / cook / the dinner
c. Hamish and Yuri / work / on their essays
d. I / talk / too much
e. Why / Fred / laugh at me
6. Ask the most appropriate question in the past continuous to find out the highlighted information.
a. The CEO was chairing the annual general meeting all day yesterday.
b. Fiona was redecorating the bathroom.
c. We were discussing the new plans a few hours ago.
d. We were drinking a cup of tea in the living room.
e. My parents were watching a documentary on TV.
f. My colleagues were talking about the merger.
7. Answer the following questions in full sentences.
a. What were you doing yesterday at 8 a.m., 11 a.m., 2 p.m. and 9 p.m.?