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Irregular verbs

Level: beginner

Most verbs have a past tense and past participle with –ed:

worked
played    
listened

But many of the most frequent verbs are irregular:

Base form Past tense Past participle
be was/were been
begin began begun
break broke broken
bring brought brought
buy bought bought
build built built
choose chose chosen
come came come
cost cost cost
cut cut cut
do did done
draw drew drawn
drive drove driven
eat ate eaten
feel felt felt
find found found
get got got
give gave given
go went gone
have had had
hear heard heard
hold held held
keep kept kept
know knew known
leave left left
lead led led
let let let
lie lay lain
lose lost lost
make made made
mean meant meant
meet met met
pay paid paid
put put put
run ran run
say said said
see saw seen
sell sold sold
send sent sent
set set set
sit sat sat
speak spoke spoken
spend spent spent
stand stood stood
take took taken
teach taught taught
tell told told
think thought thought
understand understood understood
wear wore worn
win won won
write wrote written
Irregular verbs

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Comments

Nagie23's picture Nagie23 replied on Greece

Hi,
Happy New Year. I would like to ask if the following are correct
1. Television and radio has a big part of the market.
Is this sentence correct?
Thank you in advance

Jonathan R's picture Jonathan R replied on United Kingdom

Hi Nagie23,

Happy New Year to you too :)

Yes, it's correct!

There are two things here (Television and radio). So, we might consider the subject to be 'They', which needs the third person plural verb form: Television and radio have ...

But, if the speaker says Television and radio has ... , it shows that the speaker thinks of these things (Television and radio) as two parts of a single thing (e.g. broadcast media), which is an 'it' instead of a 'they'. So, the concept is slightly different.

Another example of this is: Fish and chips is delicious. We could say 'is' instead of 'are' to show that we are talking about the dish as an undivided whole.

Does that make sense?

Jonathan

The LearnEnglish Team

xavierF's picture xavierF replied on France

Hi, I'm from France, and i would just like to know, does anyone knows free websites to improve English?
Thanks

Wendy Yassin's picture Wendy Yassin replied on United Kingdom

You're on one, they don't get much better than this.

OlaIELTS's picture OlaIELTS replied on Nigeria

This is really helpful. Thanks.

su maddiq's picture su maddiq replied on Ascension Island (British Overseas Territory)

hi my name is su maddiq

AMMAR ALDUMAINI's picture AMMAR ALDUMAINI replied on Yemen

Thanks

SajadKhan's picture SajadKhan replied on Pakistan

Hi,
In previous lesson exercises, I'm not sure if the listed answers are correct.

1. In November, we’ll have been living in this house for ten years.
Now verb phrase listed as the answer is "will have been", I think it should be "will have been living" if I'm wrong then please explain why 'living' is not considered part of the main verb.

2. Lorena must’ve been really happy to see her sister again after all this time.
In answer 'been' is listed as the Modal verb, I guess this is a mistake, the modal verb is 'must'. isn't it?

Regards

Peter M.'s picture Peter M. replied on Poland

Hi SajadKhan,

We'd like to check your examples but we're not sure which pages they come from. Could you please post the comment on the relevant page and let us know which exercise the examples come from, or else post a link to the page? Then we'll be able to check and correct any errors we find.


Peter

The LearnEnglish Team

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