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Part iv. Staying Consistent with Verb Tenses

Sarah is walking inside her school today.

Sarah walked inside her school yesterday.

Sarah will walk inside her school tomorrow.

There are three basic tenses: present, past, and future.

Each tense has the following forms:

Simple - the end of the action is unknown or unimportant. Things are simple when time isn't important.

Perfect - indicating an action has ended or will end; it is or will be completed. It starts. It ends. Things are perfect when you know everything about them.

Progressive - indicating an ongoing, progressive, or will be ongoing action; it is continuous. We have no idea when it will end; it is incomplete.

Perfect Progressive - indicating an ongoing action that will be completed at some definite time.

Here is a handy chart with all the major verb tenses:

If you need further explanation, read below for more details on how each form applies to each tense.

Simple Forms

Present Tense:

Present tense expresses an unchanging, repeated, or recurring action or situation that exists only now. It can also represent a widespread truth.

Past Tense:

Past tense expresses an action or situation that was started and finished in the past. Most past tense verbs end in -ed. The irregular verbs have special past tense forms, which must be memorized.