Self-study materials for unit III The Past Simple Tense is used:

to talk about a complete action or an event in the past. The action can be a short one

I missed the bus. I asked a question.

or a long one

I lived there for years. I walked for hours.

When we talk about actions and situations in the past we use:

a) adverbs of frequency to talk about habits

Always At school he always complained about bad food.

Usually When I was a child, I usually went to the cinema with my parents.

Seldom Jack's parents seldom went on holiday when he was a little boy.

Never My brother never missed a classical guitar performance.

b) adverbs of sequence to order events

Yesterday morning/afternoon/evening;

the day before yesterday;

Kate worked yesterday afternoon.

night/week/month/year; five minutes a week

Last spring/summer/autumn/winter; three hours two months ago

Monday /Tuesday, etc. five days a year

Jane moved into a new flat last week. He passed all his exams two months

ago.

Long ago Long ago, people learned to make musical instruments.

(Many) years later . Years later people learned to make more elaborate ones.

Many years ago Many years ago my mother taught me to play the piano.

After that After that I started taking piano classes with a professional

pianist.

(Soon) afterwards Soon afterwards I played the piano in many piano

performances.

In those days In those days piano performances were quite popular.

Then Then I gave up playing music.

At that time At that time I was rather keen on sports.

Positive form — Regular verbs

I watch television every evening. (present simple)

I watched television yesterday evening. (past simple)

watched is the past simple:

I/we /you /they he/she/it

watched

■ The past simple is often -ed. For example:

work –> worked clean –> cleaned start –> started

stay –> stayed live –> lived dance –> danced

These verbs are regular verbs.

- I clean my teeth every morning. This morning I cleaned my teeth.

- Terry worked in a bank from 1981 to 1986.

- Yesterday it rained all morning. It stopped at lunchtime.

- We enjoyed the party last Might. We danced a lot and talked to a lot of people. The party finished at midnight.

Spelling ► study –> studied marry –> married

stop –> stopped plan –> planned

Exercise 1. Complete the sentences using the words in the list. Use the Present Simple or the Past Simple:

stay finish listen watch happen visit ask invite

Example: Mike often asks questions. He asked a lot of ques­tions in class yesterday.

1. Lily and Jack ___their grandparents every weekend. They ___ them last weekend too.

2. I usually ___to the news on TV before I go to sleep at night, but last night I ___ to the news on the radio.

3. Ann seldom ___ her homework before midnight. But yesterday she ___ her homework at 10 p.m.

4. I usually ___ a lot of people to my birthday party. But last year I ___ only my close friends.

5. Take care! This crossroads is extremely dangerous. Accidents are often here. A serious accident ___ at this crossroads only a few days ago.

6. In the evening my parents ___ at home and ___TV. As usual they ___ at home and ___ TV last night.