Did you find the explanation about the present simple and the present continuous helpful? I hope so! Let’s carry on with that theme now and think about the past simple and past continuous. When do we use the past simple? Finished actions in the past, usually with a time. E.g. I bought some potatoes last week. We use the past continuous to talk about actions that were in progress at a certain time in the past, and often we use these two tenses together with when or while. For example. While I was shopping last week, I bought some potatoes. Was shopping is the longer action and bought is the shorter action that happened in the middle. We use while with the continous tense and when with the simple tense – you can change the order of the sentence, for example – I was shopping for potatoes when I saw my friend Sarah. Try it yourself in class and see what your teacher says!
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