pastprogressive

FUNCTIONS OF THE PAST CONTINUOUS

The past continuous describes actions or events in a time before now, which began in the past and is still going on at the time of speaking. In other words, it expresses an unfinished or incomplete action in the past.

It is used:

• Often, to describe the background in a story written in the past tense, e.g. "The sun was shining and the birds were singing as the elephant came out of the jungle. The other animals were relaxing in the shade of the trees, but the elephant moved very quickly. She was looking for her baby, and she didn't notice the hunter who was watching her through his binoculars. When the shot rang out, she was running towards the river..."
• to describe an unfinished action that was interrupted by another event or action, e.g. "I was having a beautiful dream when the alarm clock rang."
• to express a change of mind: e.g. "I was going to spend the day at the beach but I've decided to get my homework done instead."
• with 'wonder', to make a very polite request: e.g. "I was wondering if you could baby-sit for me tonight."

EXAMPLES

• They were waiting for the bus when the accident happened.
• Caroline was skiing when she broke her leg.
• When we arrived he was having a bath.
• When the fire started I was watching television.

(PreIntermedio)

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In this post we are going to talk about the past continuous. We will look at the syntax and the use of this tense. We are also going to compare it to the past simple and see the differences.

Past Continuous / Past Progressive

Structure

Positive form

Subject + was/were + (-ing) + Complement

Examples:

–          Michael was watching the World Cup  match.
–          They were working all night long.
–          Josh and Silvia were talking about getting married.

Negative form

Subject + wasn’t/weren’t + (-ing) + Complement

Examples:

–          John wasn’t eating because he was feeling sick.
–          Jeff wasn’t watching TV.
–          My parents weren’t having a good time because it was very cold in Canada

Question Form

(Question Word) + was/were + Subject + (-ing) + Complement

–          What were you doing last night at around 8:00pm?
–          Was Jim doing his homework?
–          Were they sleeping all morning?

Note: with verbs not normally used in the continuous form, the simple past is used.

FORMING THE PAST CONTINUOUS

The past continuous of any verb is composed of two parts : the past tense of the verb "to be" (was/were), and the base of the main verb +ing.

Subject	was/were	base + ing
They	were	watching
Affirmative
She	was	reading
Negative
She	wasn't	reading
Interrogative
Was	she	reading?
Interrogative negative
Wasn't	she	reading?

TO PLAY, PAST CONTINUOUS

Affirmative	Negative	Interrogative
I was playing	I was not playing	Was I playing?
You were playing	You were not playing	Were you playing?
He was playing	He wasn't playing	Was he playing?
We were playing	We weren't playing	Were we playing?
They were playing	They weren't playing	Were they playing?