Was Vs. Were

 

Was and were

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What are was and were?

How and when to use was and were?

First of all, let us to answer the first question.

Was and were are the past tense of the verb to be. These verbs are really common in daily life and they are needed when we talk about past actions. Was and were have the same meaning and purpose, but there is a specific use for each one.

We can use was and were in different grammar sentences like the use of was and were when we use “wish” for talking about regrets, but here we are just focusing on how to use was and were in past tense/simple past.

Was and were are the past tense form of the auxiliaries am, is and are.

Was is used with singular nouns/objects while were is used with plural nouns/objects. Therefore, we use was and were with the next pronouns.    

I	was	wans’t
It	was	wans’t
He	was	wans’t
She	was	wans’t

You	were	weren’t
We	were	weren’t
They	were	weren’t

Even though the pronoun “you” sometimes refers just to one person we always use were with the pronoun “you” in the same way we always use the form of the verb be “are” with the pronoun “you” to talk about present tense even when we are referring to one person. “You was” is totally incorrect.

How to make sentences in past tense using was and were?

As we already explained was and were are used to talk about past actions, so here you can use the next structure to make sentences using was and were.

Structure

Pronoun + was/were + complement

Example

• I was at home yesterday.
• He was the boss for two years.

Remember that we can also use was and were to make negative statements using the negative form of them, the sentence structure is the same.

Example

• I wasn’t at home yesterday.
• He wasn’t the boss for two years. He was the boss only for one year.

Wasn’t and weren’t are the contraction form for was not and were not. The full form is often used in formal way but both are correct and the contraction form is more common when in conversation.

Questions using was and were

For making questions using was and were we only need to change their position in the sentence structure and add a question mark.

Structure

Was/were + pronoun + complement +?

Example

• Were you at home yesterday?
  
• Was he at the basketball team?

Now it is time to learn how to answer questions with was and were in a short way. First of all, you need to know that there is a simple rule that we need to follow which is, “in the way someone asks you, is the way you will answer”. I’m not trying to be mean, but to clarify this look at the next example.

A: Was your brother at school last Monday?
B: Yes, he was/No, he wasn’t.

As we can see in the example above, the question starts with was so for answering the question we need to use was too. Remember to be carefully when fallowing the rule mentioned above, look at the next example:

A: Were you the manager of that company?
B: No, I wasn’t/Yes, I was.

As you can see the question starts with were, but we are not answering using were, why? Well, you need to remember that were is only for plural things (an exception occurs with the pronoun “you”) that’s why although the question starts with were we used was to answering it. The next example shows us when to answer using were.

A: Were they working with you?

B: Yes, they were/No, they weren’t. 

Time to practice!

Go to the next link https://nearpod.com sign up as student with your email, type this code AJKTL to  practice what you learned Good luck!

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