{"id":26589,"date":"2023-09-08T12:02:26","date_gmt":"2023-09-08T10:02:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/?p=26589"},"modified":"2023-09-09T16:49:07","modified_gmt":"2023-09-09T14:49:07","slug":"past-continuous","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/","title":{"rendered":"Past Continuous"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The past continuous describes ongoing events or actions<\/strong> in the past<\/strong>.
Structure:<\/mark><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

subject<\/strong> +<\/td>auxiliary “be”<\/strong> +<\/td>main verb<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
<\/td>was, were<\/td>present participle ( -ing )<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Functions of the Past Continuous:<\/mark><\/strong>
To describe the background of a story before telling more about what happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
It was getting<\/strong> dark. I was walking <\/strong>down the street. Some people were gathering<\/strong> at a distance. Out of nowhere\u2026”<\/em><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

To talk about an unfinished action that was stopped by another action or event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was having<\/strong> a nice dream when the phone rang.<\/em><\/td><\/tr>
They were watching <\/strong>TV when suddenly the power went out.<\/em><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

To talk about actions or events that were happening at a certain time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At 8 o’clock yesterday morning, I was walking <\/strong>to school.<\/em><\/td><\/tr>
At 9 o’clock last night, I was studying<\/strong>.<\/em><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Difference in meaning:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When my mother left home, I prepared my breakfast.<\/em> – I started preparing my breakfast after<\/strong> she left.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When my mother left home, I was preparing<\/strong> breakfast.<\/em> – I started preparing my breakfast before<\/strong> she left home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tips<\/strong>:
1.<\/mark> Always remember the form be + ing.<\/mark><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

incorrect<\/strong><\/td>correct<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
I was read a book.<\/em><\/td>I was reading<\/strong> a booking<\/em>.<\/td><\/tr>
She was dance Flamenco.<\/em><\/td>She was dancing<\/strong> Flamenco.<\/em><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

2.<\/mark> Spell correctly.<\/mark><\/strong>
If a verb ends in e, remove the e then add -ing.
live<\/strong> = She was living<\/strong> in Madrid.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If a verb ends in one vowel and one consonant, double the final consonant then add -ing.
sit<\/strong> = He was sitting<\/strong> down.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Exception<\/strong>: For verbs ending in w and y, do not double the consonant.
draw <\/strong>= He was drawing<\/strong><\/em>.
pray<\/strong> = They were praying<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The past continuous describes ongoing events or actions in the past.Structure: subject + auxiliary “be” + main verb was, were present participle ( -ing ) Functions of the Past Continuous:To describe the background of a story before telling more about what happened. It was getting dark. I was walking down the street. Some people were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[309],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-grammar"],"yoast_head":"\nPast Continuous | phone english blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Past Continuous | phone english blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The past continuous describes ongoing events or actions in the past.Structure: subject + auxiliary “be” + main verb was, were present participle ( -ing ) Functions of the Past Continuous:To describe the background of a story before telling more about what happened. It was getting dark. I was walking down the street. Some people were […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"phone english blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/facebook.com\/phoneenglish.es\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-09-08T10:02:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-09-09T14:49:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@phoneenglishes\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@phoneenglishes\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"2 minutes\">\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"PHONE ENGLISH\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/facebook.com\/phoneenglish.es\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/phoneenglish\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/phoneenglishes\"],\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#logo\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/phone-english1.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/phone-english1.png\",\"width\":200,\"height\":124,\"caption\":\"PHONE ENGLISH\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#logo\"}},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"phone english blog\",\"description\":\"\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/\",\"name\":\"Past Continuous | phone english blog\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2023-09-08T10:02:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-09-09T14:49:07+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"item\":{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Blog\"}},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"item\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#webpage\"}}]},{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#webpage\"},\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/76165f65d4ee87fd79bb66a66b047cd7\"},\"headline\":\"Past Continuous\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-09-08T10:02:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-09-09T14:49:07+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#webpage\"},\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#organization\"},\"articleSection\":[\"Grammar\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2023\/09\/past-continuous\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/76165f65d4ee87fd79bb66a66b047cd7\",\"name\":\"Sarah\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26589"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26589\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26631,"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26589\/revisions\/26631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}