A verb tells us the following:
|
what action takes place or what is done by a person or thing |
what a noun is |
what our perception of a noun is |
|
Maya sings. A dog barks. |
She is a
teacher. Coal is black. |
The answer seems right. The child appears to be alright. |
A verb mainly has five forms:
the base form of the verb,
the -ing form,
the past tense form,
the past participle,
the to-infinitive.
Look at the table below:
|
base form |
past tense |
past participle |
the -ing form |
to-infinitive |
|
laugh |
laughed |
laughed |
laughing |
to laugh |
|
walk |
walked |
walked |
walking |
to walk |
|
go |
went |
gone |
going |
to go |
|
catch |
caught |
caught |
catching |
to
catch |
|
cut |
cut |
cut |
cutting |
to
cut |
Helping Verbs and Main Verbs
Now
look at these sentences:
Karan was crossing the
road. I can swim.
I have
finished my work.
Very often, a verb consists of more than one word. In the
sentences above, the words was, can and have are helping verbs (or auxiliary verbs), while crossing, swim and finished are
main verbs.
Helping verbs are needed to form the grammatical
structure of a sentence, especially to form tenses.
The primary helping
verbs are forms of the verbs be, do and have.
These verbs can be used as helping
verbs or as main verbs.
Aditya is writing an essay.
(is
– helping verb; writing – main
verb)
Aslam is the
head boy of the school. (is – main
verb in the sentence)
Does
Mrs
Rao teach English?
(does
– helping verb; teach – main
verb)
I do my homework at night. (do – main verb)
Kriti has lost her pen. (has – helping
verb; lost – main verb)
Nina has a new car. (has – main verb)
The
following are the uses of be, have and
do as helping verbs:
|
use examples |
||
|
be |
to make continuous tenses
(is, am, are, was and were) |
Raj is watching TV at home. Shabnam was waiting for you at the bus stop. |
|
to make the passive |
The fruits are
kept in the basket. The thief was caught. |
|
|
use examples |
||
|
have |
to make perfect tenses (has, have
and
had) |
I have finished my
assignment. He had made a promise. |
|
use examples |
||
|
do |
to make negatives |
I
do
not like coffee. Payal
did not know the answer. |
|
to ask
questions |
Do you want some food?
What did Bala drink? |
|
|
to show
emphasis |
I do study for my exams. Preeti did
sing well. |
|
Another class of helping or auxiliary verbs
is the modal auxiliaries,
which express ideas like possibility, permission,
etc.
Main
verbs may be classified in many ways:
- regular and irregular verbs
- transitive and intransitive verbs
- finite and non-finite verbs
Regular and Irregular Verbs
In the sets of verbs given in the table on page 48,
notice how the past tense form and the past participle are formed for the verbs
laugh and walk. We 4 -d or -ed to the base form to make the past
tense form and the past participle.
Verbs
that form their past tense form and past participle by adding
-d or -ed to the base form are called regular verbs.
I work in Bengaluru. (present tense)
I worked in Chennai two years ago. (past
tense)
I have worked in Bengaluru for the past two years. (past participle)
Irregular verbs form their past tense and past participle
in many different ways. There is no fixed pattern to make the past tense and
past participle of irregular verbs. The only way is to learn them through
practice and regular use.
There
are three types of irregular verbs.
1. Verbs with all the three forms identical (the base, the past tense form, the past participle)
| 2. Verbs with two parts identical. These verbs can be either regular (learned) or irregular with a -t suffix (learnt). 3. Verbs with all three parts different |
