English Helping Verbs Course
Lesson 14
Table of contents
The online lesson with illustrationsDownload lesson's summary, worksheet and answer sheet
Online Lesson 14
In the previous lesson we learned how
to use the helping
verb HAVE to show completion.
In this lesson we will learn how to
use HAVE to show that an
action started in the past and continued until some point.
The verb HAVE
Quick note:
In the simple present tense the verb HAVE has these two forms:
- I, you, we, they => have
- She, he, it => has
We
will use these forms in our
examples and exercises.
The verb HAVE as a helping verb:
2. The action continued before it was complete
The helping verb HAVE is used to show that an action started in the past, and continued up until the present.
To do that, we add the helping verb be, in its third form: been.
|
V1 |
V2 |
V3 |
|
be |
was/were |
been |
In addition, the main verb ends in ING. For example, walk => walking
Here is how we do it:
Subject + have +
been + main verb
+ the rest of the sentence
Example:
I have been walking
for an hour.
Here
are some more examples:
|
Megan has been reading for hours. |
|
|
Robert has been
waiting
for the past 30 minutes. |
|
|
|
|
|
He has been yelling like that since he got here. |
|
|
I have been working in this place for over 20 years, so I want to try something new. |
|
|
I feel pretty tired since we have been traveling all night. |
|
3. To show something was happening lately
We also use this structure to show that something was happening lately.
|
Lately,
you have
been eating
a lot of ice cream. |
|
|
Melissa has been
working
very hard recently. |
|
|
Marge and
Tim have
been fighting
often in the last month. |
|
|
Lately, Ashley has been exercising. |
|
English Helping Verbs
Course,
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Helping Verbs Course:
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