Page 121
was, were
| Affirmative | Negative |
| I was brave. He / She / It was right. You / We / They were rich. | I wasn't scared. He/ She / It wasn't wrong. You / We / They weren't poor. |
The past simple affirmative form of the verb be is was or were.
The trip was good. We were in the museum.
The past simple negative form is was not or were not. We usually use the short forms wasn't or weren't.
Life wasn't easy in the past. The tunnels weren't big.
| Questions | Short answers | |
| Affirmative | Negative | |
| Was I scared? Was he / she / it in the tunnel? Were you / we / they with the teacher? | Yes, I was. Yes, he / she / it was. Yes, you / we / they were. | No, I wasn't. No, he / she / it wasn't. No, you / we / they weren't. |
We make the question form with was or were plus subject.
Was the tour good? Were you in the castle?
Question words go at the beginning of questions.
Who was your guide on the trip?
We make short answers with subject plus was, were, wasn't or weren't.
Was Richard in Paris last month? No, he wasn't.
Were they interested in the tunnels? Yes, they were.
there was, there were
| Singular | Plural | |
| Affirmative | There was a very dark tunnel. | There were a lot of visitors at the castle. |
| Negative | There wasn't a light in the tunnel. | There wasn't any ghosts in the old building. |
There was and there were are the past simple forms of there is and there are. There wasn't and there weren't are the negative forms.
There was a lovely café at the museum.
There weren't any good books about the tunnels.
We make the question form by inverting was / were and there.
Was there any information? There was any information?
Usage
We use there was and there were to describe what existed in the past.
Past simple: affirmative, negative and questions, regular and irregular verbs
| Affirmative | Negative |
| I / You / He / She / It / We / They visited Paris. | I / You / He / She / It / We / They didn't visit Paris. |
| Questions |
| Did I / you / he / she / it / we / they study the book about time travel? |
| Short answers |
| Affirmative | Negative |
| Yes, I / you / he / she / it/ we / they did. | No, I / you / he / she / it / we / they didn't. |
The past simple has only got one form.
I went to Paris.
You went to Istanbul.
She went to Cairo.
We make the affirmative form of past simple regular verbs by adding -ed to the base form of the verb.
My brother helped me with my homework last night.
Note the spelling rules for regular verbs:
| Most verbs | add -ed look → looked, play → played |
| Verbs ending in -e | add -d arrive → arrived, live → lived |
| Verbs ending in vowel + single consonant | double the consonant and add -ed stop → stopped, travel → travelled |
We make the negative form with did not plus base form of the verb. We usually use the short form didn't.
They didn't lose that important football match.
We make the question form with did plus base form.
Did you talk to the teacher after school?
Question words go at the beginning of questions.
What did you watch on TV last night?
We make short answers with subject plus did or didn't.
Did you like the school trip? Yes, I did.
Usage
We use the past simple to talk about finished actions in the past and actions which happened at a specific time. We often use specific time references with the past simple such as yesterday, last week, on Thursday, in 2014, two days ago.
He watched a film about time travel yesterday.
