Home › English Grammar › Adverbials ›
 

adverbials of time

 

Adverbials of time

We use adverbials of time to say:

• when something happened:

I saw Mary yesterday.
She was born in 1978.
I will see you later.
There was a storm during the night.

• for how long :

We waited all day.
They have lived here since 2004.
We will be on holiday from July 1st until August 3rd.

• how often (frequency):

They usually watched television in the evening.
We sometimes went to work by car.

We often use a noun phrase as a time adverbial:

yesterday last week/month/year one day/week/month last Saturday
tomorrow next week/month/year the day after tomorrow next Friday
today this week/month/year the day before yesterday the other day/week/month

 

Exercise

Comments

jamac's picture
Submitted by jamac on 23 February, 2013 - 06:56. Kenya
  1. hello to all of you iam  new  member for almost one week i have been having problem with writing comment from my mobile internet know iam writing my comment from acybercafe pc  thanks to the team of this site really it is very great and usefull site so iam looking forward  to improve my English with this site
Ola-abed's picture
Submitted by Ola-abed on 22 February, 2013 - 22:41. Palestinian Territories

Hi, I've sent message but I don't receive any answer,please tell me if i have  any  problem 
 

Ola-abed's picture
Submitted by Ola-abed on 18 February, 2013 - 21:02. Palestinian Territories

Hi Adam
I have a simple question,  how do we use simple past with adverb of frequency as(sometime) , I've learned in our school that we use present simple with this  adverb
Best wishes
Ola

Jeremy Bee's picture
LearnEnglish
team
Submitted by Jeremy Bee on 23 February, 2013 - 05:48. Taiwan

Hello Ola!
 
First off, we are a small team here, and we get a lot of questions every day - we can't guarantee a quick reply, although we do try! In answer to your question, you use adverbs of frequency with the past tense to talk about your habits in the past. For example:
I usually went to school by bus, but sometimes I walked. 

Hope that helps!
 
Regards
 
Jeremy Bee
The LearnEnglish Team

puru92's picture
Submitted by puru92 on 21 December, 2011 - 08:39. India

i am a new enterant in the british council's online english classes and enjoying it a lot .hope to learn lots of good english.

Karolbritto's picture
Submitted by Karolbritto on 23 November, 2011 - 13:55. Brazil

Hi Adam,
I would you like to know why I can't put the expression "during the summer" as category "how long" and the word "all night" as category "when". I didn't understand the difference between both words/expression.
Thank you,
Karol

AdamJK's picture
LearnEnglish
team
Submitted by AdamJK on 23 November, 2011 - 23:28. Poland

Hi Karol,
'During the summer' is not a length of time, which is why it can't go in that category. 'All night' is not usually a specific time.
Best wishes,
Adam
The LearnEnglish

hilalyazıcı's picture
Submitted by hilalyazıcı on 19 February, 2011 - 15:37. Turkey

ıt's great

gundes's picture
Submitted by gundes on 7 February, 2011 - 19:01. Iran

Hi
Would U please help
Are these sentences grammatically well formed?
Up until then I thought I was very clever, but......
Before that time I had not seen him . 

AdamJK's picture
LearnEnglish
team
Submitted by AdamJK on 18 February, 2011 - 23:07. Poland

Hi,
Yes, both of those sentences are well formed. It's more common to say something like 'I hadn't seen him before then' and 'Up till then I thought I was very clever', but there's nothing wrong with your sentences.
Best wishes,
Adam
The LearnEnglish Team