Past simple in stories
Use the past simple for finished events in a story: what happened, one after another. Add -ed to regular verbs, learn the common irregular forms, and keep the whole story in the past once you start.
How it works
- Regular verbs add -ed: walk → walked, live → lived, stop → stopped, study → studied.
- Say the ending: /t/ after sounds like p, k, s, sh, ch (stopped, watched); /d/ after most other sounds (played, called); an extra syllable /ɪd/ after t and d (wanted, needed).
- Many common verbs are irregular: go → went, buy → bought, eat → ate, take → took, see → saw, tell → told, think → thought, leave → left, fall → fell.
- Negatives and questions use did + base form: I didn't go. Did you see it? (not didn't went, did you saw)
- Be has two past forms: was (I, he, she, it) and were (you, we, they).
- Once a story is in the past (yesterday, last week, when I was…), keep the main events in the past simple. Don't switch to the present halfway.
Examples
Yesterday I went to the market and bought some mangoes.
We missed the last bus, so we walked home.
When I was ten, my family moved to Can Tho.
I didn't sleep well because the neighbours had a party.
She opened the door, looked outside and saw a cat in the rain.
Did you watch the match last night?
Common mistakes
Wrong: Yesterday I
goto the cinema with my friends.Right: Yesterday I went to the cinema with my friends.
Wrong: Last year we
visitHa Long Bay.Right: Last year we visited Ha Long Bay.
Wrong: I didn't
wentto school because I was sick.Right: I didn't go to school because I was sick.
Wrong: We arrived at the hotel, and then we
goto the beach.Right: We arrived at the hotel, and then we went to the beach.
Practice
1 of 16Fill the gap.
Level: EGP Verbs (past simple): regular and common irregular forms are A1–A2; keeping the past simple steady through a longer story, with did in negatives and questions, is the B1 point. Written for Gloss.