Simple past tense

SIMPLE PAST TENSE

The simple past tense, sometimes called the preterite, is used to talk about a completed action in a time before now. The simple past is the basic form of past tense in English. The time of the action can be in the recent past or the distant past and action duration is not important.

Examples: 

• We crossed the Channel yesterday.
• John Cabot sailed to America in 1498.
• My father died last year.
• He lived in Fiji in 1976.

You always use the simple past when you say when something happened, so it is associated with certain past time expressions: 

• Frequency: often, sometimes, always

• A definite point in time: last week, when I was a child, yesterday, six weeks ago

• An indefinite point in time: the other day, ages ago, a long time ago.

FORMING THE SIMPLE PAST TENSE

AFFIRMATIVE

The affirmative of the simple past tense is simple.

I was in Japan last year

She had a headache yesterday.

We did our homework last night.

NEGATIVE AND INTERROGATIVE

For the negative and interrogative simple past form of "to do" as an ordinary verb, use the auxiliary "did". Example:

We didn't do our homework last night.

The negative of "have" in the simple past is usually formed using the auxiliary "did", but sometimes by simply adding not or the contraction "n't".

The interrogative form of "have" in the simple past normally uses the auxiliary "did".

Examples

They weren't in Rio last summer.

We didn't have any money.

Were they in Iceland last January?

Did you have a bicycle when you were young?

Did you do much climbing in Switzerland?

Simple past, irregular verbs 

Some verbs are irregular in the simple past. Here, you can access to the list of all the irregular verbs in English.

https://www.usingenglish.com/reference/irregular-verbs/

Activity

In this link you can access a series of activities that will allow you to practice and improve your skills with respect to what you learned previously.

https://www.myenglishpages.com/site_php_files/grammar-exercise-simple-past.php

Strategies for Studying vocabulary

Strategies for Studying vocabulary

As you can see, here you can find a series of strategies that will be very useful to learn vocabulary in a faster and more efficient way.

• Flash cards: write words on one side and definitions on another. The cards can be used independently to quiz or to use for word sorting and matching games. Draw pictures or use symbols to aid with definitions. 

• Word Structure: Sometimes a word can give clues to the meaning in its structure. Analyzing the word’s structure and properties is a vocabulary strategy that you can use to figure out the word’s meaning. When you approach an unknown word, you can guess at its meaning by breaking down the parts of the word such as roots, prefixes, compound words, pronunciation and syllables. 

• Word sorts: study the definitions and spelling patterns and try to make relationships among the words. Sort or group words by first letter, prefix, suffix or root, meaning, or by part of speech. 

• Word mapping: A vocabulary word map is a graphic organizer that helps you think about new words or concepts in several ways. To build a word map, start by entering the new word in the middle of the map. Then, fill in the rest of the map with a definition, synonyms, antonyms, and a picture to help illustrate the new word. See the example below.

• Visual Imaging: When you use visual imaging, you think of a word that either looks like or sounds like the word whose meaning you are trying to learn. Thinking of the picture of the look-alike word and/or image will help you remember the word and its meaning. 

After using any of these strategies to learn vocabulary, you can start doing some exercises to practice what you learned in this link and additionally you will have a video that will be useful to increase your knowledge about how to acquire vocabulary.

http://www.englishvocabularyexercises.com/general-vocabulary/

Past Continuous Forms

The past continuous is formed using was/n

Past Continuous tense

Past continuous tense 

The past continuous is a verb tense which is used to show that an ongoing past action was happening at a specific moment of interruption, or that two ongoing actions were happening at the same time. Read on for detailed descriptions, examples, and past continuous exercises.

Past Continuous Forms

The past continuous is formed using was/were + present participle. Questions are indicated by inverting the subject and was/were. Negatives are made with not.

Statement: You were studying when she called.
Question: Were you studying when she called?
Negative: You were not studying when she called.

Here you can see a complete list of past contunuous forms: 
https://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/pastcontinuousforms.html 

USE 1 Interrupted Action in the Past

Use the past continuous to indicate that a longer action in the past was interrupted. The interruption is usually a shorter action in the simple past. Remember this can be a real interruption or just an interruption in time.

Examples:

• I was watching TV when she called.
• When the phone rang, she was writing a letter.
• I was listening to my iPod, so I didn't hear the fire alarm.
• While John was sleeping last night, someone stole his car.
• Sammy was waiting for us when we got off the plane.

USE 2 Specific Time as an Interruption

In USE 1, described above, the past continuous is interrupted by a shorter action in the simple past. However, you can also use a specific time as an interruption.

Examples:

• Last night at 6 PM, I was eating dinner.
• At midnight, we were still driving through the desert.
• Yesterday at this time, I was sitting at my desk at work.

IMPORTANT

In the simple past, a specific time is used to show when an action began or finished. In the past continuous, a specific time only interrupts the action.

Examples:

• Last night at 6 PM, I ate dinner.
• I started eating at 6 PM.

USE 3 Parallel Actions

When you use the past continuous with two actions in the same sentence, it expresses the idea that both actions were happening at the same time. The actions are parallel.

Examples:

• I was studying while he was making dinner.
• While Ellen was reading, Tim was watching television.
• Were you listening while he was talking?
• I wasn't paying attention while I was writing the letter, so I made several mistakes.

Here you can practice everything you've learned before.

https://agendaweb.org/verbs/past_progressive-exercises.html