Summary

1.

Verbs in English come in two varieties: regular and irregular. In both cases, they may appear in one of five different forms: base form; past tense; past participle; present participle; -s ending.

2.

Present tense has several uses, but in general it shows action happening now. Past tense tells about action occurring in the past that does not continue into the present. Future tense tells about anticipated action.

3.

The present perfect tense tells of action begun in the past and finished at an indeterminate time or continuing into the present.

4.

The past perfect tense is used to show one action happening farther back in time than another past action.

5.

The future perfect shows an action that will be completed by or before some specific time in the future.

6.

The progressive tenses use the present participle (-ing) plus a form of the verb to be.

7.

We must be careful that our verb tenses indicate a logical time relationship so we do not confuse the reader.

8.

Subject/verb agreement is an important area to focus on when revising for proper grammatical construction.

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