In this ESL grammar lesson, students rewrite several present tense sentences to make them past tense, changing the underlined words to make them consistent with the past tense.
ESL Grammar: What is the Simple Past Tense?
The simple past tense is used to talk about actions or events that happened at a specific time in the past. It is one of the most commonly used tenses in English and is vital for telling stories, sharing experiences, and reporting events.
Structure:
- Affirmative: Subject + past form of the verb
- I walked to the store.
- She saw a movie.
- They played soccer.
ESL Grammar: How to Form the Simple Past Tense
- Regular Verbs:
- For most regular verbs, add “-ed” to the base form.
- walk → walked
- play → played
- watch → watched
- For most regular verbs, add “-ed” to the base form.
ESL Grammar: Examples of Simple Past Tense
Affirmative Sentences:
- I visited my grandparents last weekend.
- She cooked dinner for her family.
- They finished their homework yesterday.
The English grammar lesson below reviews the past tense by having students change the underlined words in sentences to make them past tense. Our series of ESL grammar lessons on subjects and verbs introduce these concepts and reinforce them through helpful and instructive exercises.
This lesson is available for free download, and you can download many more English grammar lessons focusing on basic English tenses (present tense, present continuous tense, past tense, future tense) in our comprehensive, beginner-level grammar textbook Great, Great Grammar! (Book 2: Tenses).
