Siti Fatimah Lutfiana's Blog: English Tenses : Simple Past Tense

Definition Of The 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.

The above story is an example of the simple past tense.

Use Of The Simple Past

· Completed action in the past

Examples :

· Curtis cooked dinner last night

· She made a cake for sue’s party

· Duration in the past

Examples :

· He stayed up all night

· I lived in paris for two years

· Habits in the past

Examples :

· Jen played the piano when she was a child
· Tom studied Spanish when he was a student

· Series of completed actions

Examples :

· He sat down, took out a notebook and pen, and started taking notes

· He made breakfast, drove his son to school, and went to work

Signal Words

· Just now

· Yesterday

· The day before yesterday

· Last night

· Last week

· An hour ago

· Three days ago

· Two months ago

· In the past

· Long time ago

· One day

· Once

· Once upon a time

Form

regular verbs → infinitive + ed

irregular verbs → 2nd column of the table of the irregular verbs

Examples

· Affirmative sentences in the Simple Past – regular verbs

· Affirmative sentences in the Simple Past – irregular verbs

· Negative sentences in the Simple Past
Do not negate a main verb in English. Always use the auxiliary did (Simple Past of to do) and the infinitive of the verb for negations.
There is no difference between regular and irregular verbs in negative sentences.