Mastering Verb Tenses: A Guide to Understanding the Six Tenses and Their Forms

1. Verb Tenses In speaking and writing, you often need to indicate when something happens—now, yesterday, or tomorrow. In English, the different tenses of verbs are used to show when something occurs. A tense is the form of a verb that shows the time of an action or a condition.

2. Recognizing the Six Tenses of Verbs • Verbs have six tenses that indicate whether something is happening now, was happening at some time in the past, or will be happening at some time in the future. Each of these tenses can be expressed in two different forms: Basic and Progressive

3. Basic Forms of the Six Tenses

4. Recognizing the Six Tenses of Verbs • The basic forms are identified simply by their tense names. The progressive forms, however, are identified by their tense names plus the word progressive. • The next chart gives examples of the six tenses in their progressive form. Note that all these forms end in –ing.

5. Progressive Forms of the Six Tenses

6. Verb Tenses • Give it a shot! - Use tenses of the same verb in three sentences about making a sand castle—yesterday, today and tomorrow. Take note of how the verb changes from sentence to sentence.