VERBS
The verb is the most important part of the sentence.
It is the action or state of the subject in a sentence. The sentence cannot be
formed without a verb. The verbs are of two types- Helping verbs and Main
verbs. A helping verb is a state or and a main verb is an action. For example,
in the sentence, "The pencil is on
the book," the helping verb is not an action. It only is the state of
the subject of the sentence. It tells the tense of the sentence. Whereas in the
sentence, "The girl is eating a
chocolate," the verb eating implies an action but the helping verb is
about the tense of the action.
Knowledge of helping verbs helps
understand the various tenses of the main verbs used in different situations.
If is talks about the present time was talks about the past tense. In the
sentence, "The pencil is on the book,"
talks about the preset state of the pencil, the sentence, "The pencil was on the book,"
indicates past state of the pencil. It tells the state of the pencil of the
past and not of the present. If one says, "A man is standing under the tree," you can now go and see him
because the action of standing is now going on while in the sentence, "A man was standing under the tree,"
tells the action of standing is not going on now but it was in continuation at
some past time. Likewise the sentence, “The man will be standing under the tree,” talks about the action
standing not in the present nor in the past but it will be in continuation at
some point of time in the future. So, now you may have understood that helping
verbs do not change the action but change the time of action.
As every language has its own list, English
too has its own list. Particular helping verbs are used with particular subjects
only. Some helping verbs, when used with different subjects, give different
meanings. For example, am is used
with I only. Are is used with we, you,
they and other plural subjects in the present.
To know subject and helping verb agreement,
click the following link:
The main verb is the main action in
the sentence. The sentence, “The boy
draws a picture,” indicates the boy is about to do the action of drawing or
this action takes place before eyes now. But the sentence, “The boy drew a picture,” tells that the
action of drawing was completed in the past, not now. “The boy will draw a picture,” tells that the action of drawing will
happen in the future. The verb form, draw/s talks about the present action but
drew talks about a completed action of the past. Main verbs, without the help
of the helping verbs, too talks about tenses but all the various tenses cannot
be expressed. The main verb has different forms to give different meanings:
Base
form/Present Tense (V1) Past Tense (V2) Past Participle (V3) Present Participle (V4)
draw
drew drawn drawing
Click
the following link to see the verb forms:
Click
the following link to do the exercises:
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