{"id":6357,"date":"2017-04-06T12:19:44","date_gmt":"2017-04-06T10:19:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/?p=6357"},"modified":"2021-10-11T09:27:21","modified_gmt":"2021-10-11T07:27:21","slug":"simple-past","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/phoneenglish.es\/blog\/2017\/04\/simple-past\/","title":{"rendered":"Simple Past"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>USE 1: Completed Action in the Past<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Use the Simple Past to express the idea that an action <strong>started and finished<\/strong> at a <strong>specific time in the past<\/strong>. Sometimes, the speaker may not actually mention the specific time, but they do have one specific time in mind.<\/p>\n<p>Examples:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>played<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0soccer last Saturday.<\/li>\n<li>I\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>didn&#8217;t meet<\/strong><\/span> my friends last weekend.<\/li>\n<li>Last year, I\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>didn&#8217;t visit <\/strong><\/span>my relatives in Australia.<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Did<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0you\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>have<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0dinner last night?<\/li>\n<li>I <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>cleaned <\/strong><\/span>my room yesterday.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>USE 2 : A Series of Completed Actions<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>We use the Simple Past to <strong>list a series of completed actions in the past<\/strong>. These actions happen 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and so on.<\/p>\n<p>Examples:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I <b>left<\/b>\u00a0work,<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">\u00a0<strong>met<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0my friends, and\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>ate<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0at a nice restaurant.<\/li>\n<li>He\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>arrived<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0from the airport at 9:00,\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>checked<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0into the hotel at 10:00, and\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>met<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0the others at 11:00.<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Did<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0you\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>add<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>flour,\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>pour<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0in the milk, and then\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>add<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0the eggs?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>USE 3: Duration in Past<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Simple Past can be used with a <strong>duration which starts and stops in the past<\/strong>. A duration is a longer action often indicated by expressions such as: <strong>for two years, for five minutes, all day, all year, etc.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Examples:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>lived<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0in Australia for two years.<\/li>\n<li>Sandra\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>studied<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0Japanese for three years.<\/li>\n<li>They\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>did not dance <\/strong><\/span>at the party all night<strong>.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>We\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>talked<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0on the phone for thirty minutes.<\/li>\n<li>A: How long\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>did<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0you\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>wait<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0for her?<br \/>\nB: I\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>waited<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>for thirty minutes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>USE 4: Habits in the Past<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Simple Past can also be used to describe <strong>a habit which stopped in the past<\/strong>. It can have the same meaning as &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.englishpage.com\/verbpage\/usedto.html\">used to<\/a>.&#8221; To make it clear that we are talking about a habit, we often add expressions such as: <strong>always, often, usually, never, when I was a child, when I was younger, etc<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Examples:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>learned<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0the piano when I was a child.<\/li>\n<li>He <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>didn\u2019t play<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0soccer.<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Did<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>you\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>play<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0a musical instrument when you were a kid?<\/li>\n<li>She\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>worked<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>at a restaurant after school.<\/li>\n<li>They never\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>went<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0to parties, they always\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>stayed<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0home.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>USE 5: Past Facts or Generalizations<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Simple Past can also be used to <strong>describe past facts or generalizations which are no longer true<\/strong>. As in USE 4 above, this use of the Simple Past is quite similar to the expression &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.englishpage.com\/verbpage\/usedto.html\">used to<\/a>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Examples:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>didn&#8217;t like<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0vegetables before.<\/li>\n<li>She\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>was<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0shy as a child, but now she is very outgoing.<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Did<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0you\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>live<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0in Madrid when you\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>were<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0a child?<\/li>\n<li>People\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>paid<\/strong><\/span>\u00a0much more to use the Internet in the past.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>USE 1: Completed Action in the Past Use the Simple Past to express the idea that an action started and finished at a specific time in the past. Sometimes, the speaker may not actually mention the specific time, but they do have one specific time in mind. Examples: I\u00a0played\u00a0soccer last Saturday. I\u00a0didn&#8217;t meet my friends [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[309],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-grammar"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v16.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Simple Past | 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\/2017\/04\/simple-past\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Simple Past | phone english blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"USE 1: Completed Action in the Past Use the Simple Past to express the idea that an action started and finished at a specific time in the past. 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