We didn't understand the culture - simple past

Simple past regular verbs – beginners

Hi and welcome to another great lesson from New English Academy. I’m your host Giles Parker and today we’re going to look at one of the few nice and predictable things in English grammar – the simple past for regular verbs. Simple past regular is so regular, even new verbs, like ‘to google’ follow the rules! Our comprehension text is about two cross-cultural problems when people from one culture visited another culture. This lesson is aimed at beginner learners of English but there is something here for everyone. Check out the website, New English Academy.com for the interactive online grammar and vocabulary learning games, comprehension tests and pronunciation practice for simple past regular verbs. And, if you like what you hear, please add a comment or a review on iTunes or Stitcher Radio or send me an email and let me know how I can improve this.

First I’ll talk about the meaning of the simple past, then look at the rules for spelling for the affirmative and negative, then how to make yes/no questions and finally we’ll find out which wh questions take ‘did’ and which don’t. Phew, that seems like a lot but it is all worth it. I’ll save irregular verbs like ‘do’, ‘go’ and ‘be’ etc for another lesson.

You can guess that the simple past talks about – yep! - the past, so that is things before now. But what kind of things and what kind of past does it talk about? Well, the simple past talks about things that have finished, that are complete, over with. It is used to tell stories. Also, very importantly, we usually know WHEN specifically, not just before now, because there is often a time marker like, ‘last month’ or ’10 years ago’ or ‘in March’ or ‘in 1989’, or ‘yesterday’ etc as part of the statement. If there isn’t a time marker in the statement, then we have already said the WHEN before or we know that the listener already knows what we are talking about.

Simple past regular verbs are easy to form – which makes life easier for English learners. All you have to do is add ‘-d’, ‘-ed’ or ‘-ied’ to the end of the base form of the verb. They don’t change with the person.

How do you know when to add ‘-d’, ‘-ed’ or ‘-ied’? Check how the verb ends AND check if the last vowel is stressed or not. Let’s start with the easy rules first.

· If a verb ends with a consonant e.g. k, p, or n, etc, then just add –ed.

o Last year I worked in Perugia.

o I watched a fine game of rugby yesterday.

Did you notice all the time markers? They are very useful and really help us. English speakers get kind of uncomfortable when they don’t know WHEN something is happening. They don’t like vague time and usually try to be very specific about WHEN, oh, and WHO. Back to the rules.

· If a verb ends with an e, then just add –d.

o I really like living in Italy but I also liked living in Japan.

o I hope the economy improves, but I hoped that last year too.

· If a verb ends in a vowel (a, e, or o) AND a y, then just add –ed to the y.

o I stayed in Japan for 16 years.

o I really enjoyed my time there.

· If a verb ends in a consonant and y then change the y to –ied.

o I tried to speak Japanese every day.

o I studied at a language school for a while.

· It is also important to check how the verb sounds. If a verb ends in a vowel which is stressed and one consonant, then double the consonant and add –ed.

o I stopped living there over ten years ago.

o I planned to move to America.

· If a verb ends in two vowels and a consonant then don’t double the consonant; just add –ed.

o The weather was bad last week. It rained for days.

o I shouted at my daughter after she came home very late last night.

· If a verb ends in two consonants, don’t double the last consonant, just add –ed.

o I wanted to be an explorer when I was a kid.

o The teachers never helped me do this.

· Lastly, watch out for those tricky Brits. British speakers of English double the last consonant in verbs that end in l such as travel which becomes travelled, cancel – cancelled, excel – excelled. Can you think of other verbs that end in l?

So, to summarize the rules so far – make sure you show WHEN something happened with a time marker. Make sure you are talking about something that is finished. Check the spelling and pronunciation of the verb. You can get more information and practice on how to pronounce the verb endings in the online lesson

Now, how about making negatives? This is another of those rare moments when English is easy. Just add ‘did not’ or ‘didn’t’ to the base form of the verb. You don’t have to change the verb, you don’t have to show the number, the base form stays the same. The WHEN is in ‘didn’t. For example,

· I didn’t live in New York when I lived in America.

· I didn’t study at all last week.

Don’t forget to emphasize the first syllable of ‘didn’t’ just to make sure people know it is negative.

How about yes/no questions? Again, use ‘did’ and move the subject. Don’t change the verb. Why? Because the time is shown in ‘did’! Brilliant! Well done, English! Look at these examples.

· Did you open the window?

· Did you start the car OK?

Do you remember how to pronounce yes/no questions? Listen to my voice – did you get it? The intonation rises up at the end. Remember, the grammar AND the intonation help you transfer your meaning to the other person.

If you want to emphasize the time of your answer just repeat the ‘did’. For example;

· Did you start the car OK this morning? Yes, I did thanks.

· Did you open the window? No, I didn’t.

What about wh questions. Well, for regular verbs, use ‘did’ UNLESS the question is WHO or WHAT and the answer is about the subject. Check out these examples.

· Who arrived this morning?

· When did you arrive?

· Where did you live before?

· What happened yesterday?

· Why did you cook that?

· How did you manage to do that?

Did you see the differences? So, Wh questions take ‘did’ EXCEPT WHO and WHAT. Instead, just put the simple past form of the verb after WHO or WHAT.

Finally I wanted to show you that these rules work well with new words too. For example, the internet services company, Google, is so good at what it does that it has become a verb. Isn’t that incredible? So when people look for something online, they often ‘google’ it. A quick test – is ‘to google’ a regular English verb? It seems to be – try it in the simple past:

· I googled fishing gear yesterday and came up with a whole bunch of different websites.

· Why did you google that?

· I didn’t google sea-fishing things though.

Try it with other tests – how do you use ‘to google’ in the future, or with modal auxiliaries? It seems to be regular – just like other regular verbs that end in e, just add –d. That is one of the nice things about English and I bet most other languages too. When you have a rule you can use it to test things you don’t know. While you are learning English, always use the rules you know to test the evidence and maybe then you can predict how the language works. It will give you more confidence and help you so much as you learn. In the end you will become more in control of your learning, which is so important.

And a quick warning – watch out for some speakers of American English who sometimes use the simple past for when they mean the present perfect, e.g. ‘Did you eat yet?’ ‘Yeah, I ate already.’ These tenses have completely different meanings but some speakers will use to mean the other. Check out the online lesson on the website for more information on the present perfect.

OK, enough of my rant. Now we’re going to listen to or read the comprehension text which talks about how people from one culture had a couple of small problems while they visited another culture. As always look out for examples of the grammar point.

Comprehension text: We didn’t understand the other culture

These two stories about people who had small problems in other cultures come from a great book called ‘Intercultural Interactions’ by Richard Brislin.

North Americans ordering food in a South American restaurant

A few years ago, two Americans, Candy and Ron visited their friends Juliana and Gustavo in Porto Alegre, Brazil. One evening, Juliana and Gustavo invited their guests to a nice restaurant in town. When they all arrived, the waitress showed them to their table. Then, she put just one menu in the middle of the table. The Americans were very surprised at this, but their Brazilian friends were not at all worried.

Ron called the waitress back and asked her why she had put just the one menu on the table for all of them. The waitress replied that the menus were all the same so it wouldn’t be a problem and went back to the kitchen. Candy and Ron were confused by this but Juliana and Gustavo were relaxed and enjoying themselves. Everyone looked at the menu together. The North Americans tried to remember their own choices and complained to each other about how rude the waitress was. The Brazilians accepted the situation and decided what they wanted together.

Why were the Americans unhappy? Why were the Brazilians comfortable? Well, Candy and Ron expected to get a menu each, like they did at home in America. They expected to choose their own dishes themselves. But, in Brazil, often people choose dishes together, in a group. The Brazilians expected to share the menu and talk about their choices together. Candy and Ron had to learn that sometimes when in Rome, do as the Romans do.

Korean time in America

Mr and Mrs Kim emigrated from Pusan in South Korea to America in the late 1980’s. They settled in to their new home in Colorado and slowly adapted to their new lives. They learned English and joined a local church and other organizations. They made new friends and all seemed well. But, they still noticed differences between American ways of doing things and Korean ways. And they sometimes missed the old ways. For example, in Korea, their friends often dropped in to chat. They never planned or arranged to meet, their friends just stopped by when they wanted. And they stopped by their friends’ too.

But in Colorado, their American friends never stopped by or dropped in for a cup of tea and a chat. They always arranged meetings and appointments. It seemed like friendship was a type of business. Mr Kim talked about this with an American neighbour, who immediately invited Mr and Mrs Kim to dinner at her house, next Friday, at 7:30pm. Mr Kim accepted of course, but he was disappointed and frustrated.

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Why was he disappointed? Well, Mr Kim expected the neighbour to understand what he wanted. He wanted more informal, social friendships. He wanted time to be more relaxed with his new friends and neighbours. Unfortunately, his new host culture isn’t like that. Most Americans prefer formal time arrangements and are not happy with friends just dropping in or stopping by. They prefer to schedule time together. Mr and Mrs Kim just had to learn to live with the new way of doing things in their new home. What do you feel most comfortable with?