Simple Past Tense

Simple Past is a common tense in English. You should understand it, and know it well.

What's next?

1. Read and understand the following explanations and examples

2. Read and understand the Rules

3. Practice, Practice, Practice with the Exercises

Are you a teacher?

Save yourself time and effort. Get the Step-by-Step Guide to the Simple Past Tense. It includes all the materials and worksheets you need to teach this tense effectively.

How Do We Use this Tense?

Simple Past is a form of the verb that shows the action happened in the past.

Here are the different usages of this tense:

• Actions that happened in the past

Make sure you also read:

Examples of Typical Time Expressions

Simple Past Example Sentences

Simple Past or Present Perfect – Which Tense Should You Use?

Actions that happened in the past

(The verbs are in bold)

He broke his tooth last week.

Last year he had only two candles on the cake.

He was very dirty 30 minutes ago.

She asked for a kiss.

He played and he lost.

They worked very hard for this.

Examples of
Typical Time Expressions

• an hour ago
• yesterday
• last week
• last month
• 2 years ago
• on last Monday
• in 1974
• when I was young

Practice reading, writing and speaking in the simple past tense. Download the English Grammar Stories and Exercises Series.

What's Next?

1. If you want, you can REREAD the previous explanations and examples

2. Read and understand the Rules

3. Practice, practice, practice with the Exercises