Ukrainians worth knowing and four past tenses
About course
Embark on a captivating journey through the past tenses with remarkable Ukrainians! We've delved into the intriguing stories of talented individuals and developed a lesson focusing on the four forms of the past tense.
From this course, you'll learn about five outstanding personalities born in Ukraine:
- Valentyna Sanyina-Schlee, a fashion designer from New York with Ukrainian roots
- Volodymyr Khavkin, a biologist
- Maryna Viazovska, a Ukrainian mathematician
- Petro Prokopovych, a Ukrainian beekeeper and founder of rational frame beekeeping
- Max Levchin, a co-founder and chief engineer of PayPal, vice president of development at Google.
Using texts about these remarkable figures, we'll tell you about four past tenses:
Past Simple
Past Continuous
Past Perfect
Past Perfect Continuous
In this course, interactive exercises on this grammar await you to solidify the learned material effectively.
Learn English and discover more about incredible Ukrainians with a lesson from Booyya!
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Level:
Intermediate
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20 minutes
- 1 lesson
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8
tasks
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Teacher's language:
English
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Interactive exercises
Course program
1 LESSON
READING | EXTRAORDINARY UKRAINIANS
GRAMMAR REFERENCE
TASKS
Who is this course for
This lesson is designed for those who want to structure their grammar knowledge, especially concerning past tenses. Additionally, it's an opportunity to practice and reinforce the rules of using past tenses in the English language.
Our lesson will also resonate with those who grasp grammar better within context and are generally interested in acquiring new knowledge.
For those who were unfamiliar with the names of the Ukrainians mentioned in the description and are eager to learn something intriguing about Ukraine while studying English.
And for individuals who are inspired by real-life stories and seize the chance to discover how someone achieved something remarkable.
What will you get after the course
You will learn and practice four forms of the past tense:
Past Simple
Past Continuous
Past Perfect
Past Perfect Continuous
You will also discover captivating stories of outstanding Ukrainians you might not have heard about before.
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Level:
Intermediate
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20 minutes
- 1 lesson
-
8
tasks
-
Teacher's language:
English
-
Interactive exercises
Past tenses in English are grammatical tenses used to describe events that occurred at some point in the past. These tenses are among the three primary tenses (along with the present and future) and include four aspects: simple, perfect, continuous, and perfect continuous. To indicate the past tense, we use a specific verb form (predicate) and sometimes auxiliary words.
Everything about Past Tense and its variations in English
Sentences in the past tense allow us to describe events that started and ended either long ago or more recently. Additionally, the past tense in English can be used to express our hypotheses (e.g., "He could have entered the university if he had tried harder") and polite expressions (e.g., "Pardon, I wanted to ask if this train stops at Zhmerynka"). However, English is very diverse and allows us to emphasize different aspects of our or others' past experiences. The four variations of the past tense help us do this effectively.
Past Simple
The Past Simple tense in English allows us to talk about events that have already ended. Here are a few simple examples:
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He was born in Odesa.
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I forgot my bag.
To construct a sentence in the Past Simple, you need to use the following structure:
Noun/Pronoun + verb with -ed ending / second form if the verb is irregular
Markers that help indicate the use of the Past Simple tense include:
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last month, week, summer, etc.
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in 2007
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when I was in school
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ago
Past Perfect
The Past Perfect tense allows us to describe events that occurred or were completed before the start of another event in our past:
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The performance had finished when we entered the theater.
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Hardly had they gone out for a run when their boss called.
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Lisa had drunk just a cup of tea before leaving home.
The rules for constructing sentences in the Past Perfect tense in English provide us with the following structure:
Noun/Pronoun + had + verb with -ed ending or third form if the verb is irregular
You can recognize this tense by markers such as:
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before that night
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when
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never before
Past Continuous
This aspect allows us to describe prolonged events that were interrupted by shorter actions:
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I was relaxing on the riverbank when I saw a boat with fishermen.
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Maria was sitting at a cafe when the mobile rang.
Past Continuous Tense in English has the following structure:
Noun/Pronoun + was/were + verb with -ing ending
Markers of this tense include:
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when
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at the same time
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during (some period of time)
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while
Past Perfect Continuous
This complex tense allows us to describe a past event that lasted until the beginning of another event or action that has already ended (whether long ago or not):
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Johnny had been living in Spain for nine months when he lost his business.
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She had been finishing chemistry courses before she entered medical school.
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Before Robin arrived, I had been training for nearly thirty minutes.
Past Perfect Continuous Tense has the following grammatical structure:
Noun + had been + verb with -ing ending
Markers of the Past Perfect Continuous tense include:
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for a week
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all morning
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since
Table of differences between past tense forms in English
To help you easily remember and recall the sentence construction features of the four aspects of the past tense, we’ve organized all the important information into a table. We’ve also added structures for negative and interrogative sentences, which were not mentioned above.
|
Affirmative Sentence |
Negative Sentence |
Interrogative Sentence |
|
|
Simple |
Subject + verb with -ed or in the second form |
Subject + did not + verb |
(Questions word) Did + subject + verb |
|
Perfect |
Subject + had + verb with -ed or in the third form |
Subject + had not + verb with -ed or in the third form |
(Questions word) Had + subject + verb with -ed or in the third form |
|
Continuous |
Subject + was/were + verb with -ing |
Subject + was/were + not + verb with -ing |
(Questions word) Was/were + subject + verb with -ing |
|
Perfect Continuous |
Subject + had been + verb with -ing |
Subject + had not been + verb with -ing |
(Questions word) Had+ subject + been + verb with -ing |
How to learn all past tenses in English in one lesson
Our brain memorizes new information much easier when it receives it in an engaging form. For example, when we don’t just try to forcefully memorize new words and grammar rules but get acquainted with them through a captivating narrative that grabs our attention from the first words.
This is exactly the principle used by the author of a new course on the Booyya platform, dedicated to the four past tenses. Instead of boring rules, you can explore the biographies of lesser-known yet very extraordinary Ukrainians. At the same time, you’ll have the opportunity to easily master a significant portion of English grammar.
This course consists of just one lesson. Besides the promised biographies, it offers you:
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grammar explanations presented in an accessible and understandable way with examples;
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interactive exercises that will help you better understand the features and differences between the various tense forms and solidify your knowledge;
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inspiration and skills to talk about your past in English with friends and acquaintances.
You’ll have access to the course from any gadget, allowing you to master it even on your way to work or on vacation.
- access to all 194 courses on the platform, except for the English PRO series
- 2 - 4 new courses every month
- exclusive access to SUBSCRIPTION ONLY courses
- access to the Smarte+ - smart online tool for English practice
- unlimited studying for the selected period
- access to self-study English plans
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