Past Progressive

Past Progressive

The past continuous tense is used to talk about actions or events that were going on around a particular point of time in the past.

Past Continuous Forms

The past continuous is formed using: Subject + was / were + ing form of the verb. Questions are indicated by inverting the subject and was/were. Negatives are made with not.

Affirmative: You were studying when she called. Question: Were you studying when she called?

Negative: You were not studying when she called.

What were you doing when the guests turned up? I was working in the garage.

Past Continuous Uses

Use the past continuous to indicate that a longer action in the past was interrupted. The interruption is usually a shorter action in the simple past.

• I was watching TV when she called.

• When the phone rang, she was writing a letter.

• While John was sleeping last night, someone stole his car.

When you use the past continuous with two actions in the same sentence, it expresses the idea that both actions were happening at the same time. The actions are parallel.

• I was studying while he was making dinner.

• While Ellen was reading, Tim was watching television.

• What were you doing while you were waiting?

In English, we often use a series of parallel actions to describe the atmosphere at a particular time in the past.

• When I walked into the office, several people were busily typing, some were talking on the phones, the boss was yelling directions, and customers were waiting to be helped. One customer was yelling at a secretary and waving his hands. Others were complaining to each other about the bad service.

The past continuous with words such as "always" or "constantly" expresses the idea that something irritating or shocking often happened in the past. Remember to put the words "always" or "constantly" between "be" and "verb+ing."

Examples:

She was always coming to class late.

He was constantly talking. He annoyed everyone.

I didn't like them because they were always complaining.