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Past Simple and Past Continuous – (Adult version) Learn English Grammar


00:00:01hi welcome to class

00:00:03remember these are video classes so you

00:00:06can pause or rewind if you didn’t know

00:00:09the stencil watch again and again until

00:00:12you feel completely comfortable using

00:00:14the new grammar and the new vocabulary

00:00:17remember leave your comments or

00:00:19questions and tell your friends about us

00:00:22your class starts now

00:00:33when we talk about moments in the past

00:00:36we can use many different forms an

00:00:39example of the most common form is the

00:00:43past simple for example I went to New

00:00:46York last week the form we used here is

00:00:49subject verb in past or verb too and the

00:00:54object but when we tell a story about

00:00:57the past we probably won’t only use the

00:01:01past simple for example I was talking to

00:01:05my friend for this I used past

00:01:09continuous and the form is subject B in

00:01:14the past so was or were depending on the

00:01:18subject and the verb with ing which is

00:01:23called Jarrett and the object okay now

00:01:29you’re going to watch your story before

00:01:31you watch get a pen and paper you’re

00:01:34going to write the actions that you see

00:01:36in either past simple or past continuous

00:01:40oh my god something crazy happened last

00:01:48night

00:02:31so now you’re going to watch again with

00:02:34the answers oh my god something crazy

00:02:38happened last night so I was having sex

00:02:45with my girlfriend and then suddenly the

00:02:48cat jumped on the bed so he stopped and

00:02:52looked it was staring at us and meowing

00:02:58at us it was really strange I had to

00:03:08stop I had to shoot it in the face it

00:03:16was just so strange

00:03:22if you got everything correct well done

00:03:25you’re a genius if not continue watching

00:03:30okay let’s look at each action of the

00:03:34story

00:03:35imagine this timeline represents the

00:03:38time of the story the first action is

00:03:41have sex the duration of this action is

00:03:45quite long and lasts the whole of the

00:03:47story for that reason because it’s the

00:03:50background action happening all the time

00:03:53in the story we’ll say it in past

00:03:55continuous so I was having sex our next

00:04:02action is the cat jump it happened once

00:04:05very short time in the middle of the

00:04:07having sex so we say it in past simple

00:04:11the cat jumped on the bed our next

00:04:16action exactly the same reason the stop

00:04:20so we will just say we stopped the next

00:04:24action exactly the same notice you have

00:04:29passed simple past simple and this one

00:04:31we looked also past simple to list past

00:04:35simple actions will show the order of

00:04:38events the next action is the cat stare

00:04:43the cat stare lasted a long time he

00:04:46wants to put emphasis on a long time for

00:04:50that reason he said the cat was staring

00:04:53at us so here’s another reason for past

00:04:56continuous it puts emphasis on a long

00:04:59time the next action was the cat meow

00:05:03this happened a few times many many

00:05:06times and this is also another reason to

00:05:09use past continuous the cat was meowing

00:05:12something happens many many times

00:05:16continuous puts emphasis on that

00:05:20so we have a few reasons to use past

00:05:22simple and past continuous with past

00:05:26continuous background actions I was

00:05:29having sex repeated actions

00:05:32the cat was meowing for long actions the

00:05:36cat was staring for a long time past

00:05:40simple basically the important actions

00:05:44in the story but they’re short actions

00:05:47and usually only happen once okey-dokey

00:05:53now you’re going to watch another

00:05:55cartoon in this story notice when we use

00:05:59past simple and when we use past

00:06:02continuous but also the reasons why we

00:06:06use each form November 1938 it was

00:06:18raining and I was hungry she looked at

00:06:22me and said nice night isn’t it she was

00:06:26smoking a cigarette knee tapping her

00:06:28fingers on the table she was talking to

00:06:31me but I couldn’t hear anything I wasn’t

00:06:35thinking about anything other than the

00:06:37woman just outside she was holding some

00:06:40hay in her hand

00:06:42I answered the waitress jelly

00:07:05time for a test in these situations

00:07:09should we write past simple or past

00:07:12continuous write your answers and follow

00:07:15the link after the video to check