3rd Intense hour -- Past Simple & Past Continuous Tense Review

The rules for verb usage can be found in thousands of places on the internet. The following is a very basic guide using excerpts from web pages I think are clear and concise.  I have inserted a link to BBC English Council's website where you can see the rules below explained in different terms and do a quiz to test your understanding. Let me know if you need additional clarification or information.  (The chart below also shows the past perfect which will be discuss later in the 4th intense hour post.)

PAST SIMPLE

The past simple tense describes finished actions and states*. When the action happened may be mentioned or may be clear from the situation.

Finished actions  "I checked the figures carefully yesterday“.

Past habits “I played tennis when I was younger”.

Actions following one another ” I arrived at the hotel, checked in and went straight for dinner”.

The tricky parts of this tense are normally the pronunciation of the regular verb -ed endings  (for example: kicked /t/, decided /id/ played /d/) and  learning the past tense of the irregular verbs (for example: go – went, buy – bought, tell – told and so on). (See a list of irregular verbs here.)

*(States or stative verbs describe states or conditions which continue over a period of time: like, love, hate, want, need, hear and see are examples of stative verbs. These verbs are not normally used in the progressive (+ing) form. 

Right:   'I've always liked tennis'

Wrong: 'I've always been liking tennis'. )

PAST CONTINUOUS: The past continuous form is used to tell about an action in progress at a particular time in the past.  Click here for more examples and a quiz to test your understanding. Let me know if you want exercises and more information about how to use the past continuous.

Action in progress at a particular time
“I was waiting for a taxi for over one hour”
(People say this but it must be part of a before and after situation to make sense. Fx "I was waiting for a taxi for over one hour when it began to snow."  Otherwise,  the past simple is used more in this context. It’s more natural to say and hear “I waited for a taxi for over one hour”)

Several situations in progress happening at the same time
“The company was suffering heavy losses and many employees were losing their jobs”

Background information
“I was trying to call you but there was no reception in the area”

Action in progress interrupted by another action which is in the past simple
“I was watching television when the phone rang“

We often use the time expressions “while”, “when” and “as” with the past continuous to mean ‘during the time that something was happening‘

• “While/when we were developing the prototype, we carried out some tests”.

BUT if you mean ‘at the time that’, we only use “when” with the past simple

• “She was shocked when I told her the news”

Past Simple or Past Continuous?
Sometimes you can use either tenses. The past simple suggests a separate, complete action while the past continuous emphasises the duration of the action.

“We discussed the report and agreed that we needed to adopt a more direct strategy.”

“We were discussing the report for an hour. Eventually we decided to adopt a more direct strategy.”