Mastering the Past Simple

• English
• Primary Education
• Age 10

Mastering the Past Simple

Learning Objective

At the end of the lesson, you will be able to confidently use the past simple tense in your spoken and written English.

What do you already know about the past simple tense?

What is the Past Simple?

The past simple is a tense used to talk about completed actions in the past. It is often formed by adding 'ed' to regular verbs or using irregular verb forms.

Regular Verbs in the Past Simple

Regular verbs form the past simple by adding 'ed' to the base form of the verb. For example: 'walk' becomes 'walked'.

Irregular Verbs in the Past Simple

Irregular verbs have unique forms in the past simple. For example: 'go' becomes 'went'.

Positive and Negative Sentences

In positive sentences, we use the past simple form of the verb. In negative sentences, we use 'did not' + base form of the verb. For example: 'She played tennis.' / 'He did not study.'

Question Sentences

In question sentences, we use 'did' + base form of the verb + subject. For example: 'Did you eat dinner?'

Time Expressions

Time expressions like 'yesterday', 'last week', 'in 1999' are often used with the past simple to indicate when the action happened.

Practice Exercise

Complete the sentences with the correct form of the verb in the past simple.

Write down 3 things you learned in this lesson.

Have students enter three things they learned in this lesson. With this they can indicate their own learning efficiency of this lesson.

Write down 2 things you want to know more about.

Here, students enter two things they would like to know more about. This not only increases involvement, but also gives them more ownership.

Ask 1 question about something you haven't quite understood yet.

The students indicate here (in question form) with which part of the material they still have difficulty. For the teacher, this not only provides insight into the extent to which the students understand/master the material, but also a good starting point for the next lesson.