Verbs

English verbs come in many forms, and matters of verb usage can become quite complicated, especially for non-native speakers. In everyday writing, problems with verb use frequently occur, particularly unseemly shifts in verb tense. Verbs come in three simple tenses (present, past, and future), each of which has three aspects (progressive, perfect, and perfect progressive). A verb has a voice (either active or passive); and every verb has a mood.

Most English verbs are regular. That means their past tense and past participle are constructed by adding -d or -ed: I walk; You walked; They had walked. There are about 200 verbs in English that inexplicably form the past tense and past participle in an irregular way, and these troublesome verbs can cause problems in writing. If you have used a verb in the past tense that doesn't look right to you, look it up: in a good standard desk dictionary, verbs with unusual or irregular tense formations will have their past tense and past participle spellings written out. For instance, this entry is from the Oxford Canadian Dictionary:

If the dictionary entry gives no spellings for the past tense or past participle, then they are formed the regular way: with -d or -ed added to the end.

Practice Exercises (12 questions)

Using Verbs

Click on the links below to increase your confidence:

• using tenses
• active and passive voice
• determining the mood of your verbs