Master the building blocks of language and grammar with our in-depth guides on the parts of speech, such as nouns, verbs and more.
What are compound words? Playground, dining room, sister–in–law. What do these words have in common, if anything at all? If you guessed that they’re all… Read More »What are Compound Words? (150+ Compound Words)
The present perfect tense is a form of the present tense that highlights the connection between the present and past. We use the present perfect… Read More »What’s the Present Perfect Tense?
Adjectives tell us how much or to what extent something has a quality or trait. Comparatives compare the amount with something else, whereas superlatives say something has the most or greatest extent of that trait.
Sweep is present tense, swept is both the past tense and past participle form of the verb sweep.
The active voice shows the subject as ‘in action’, and doing something. The passive voice shows the action as being received by or done to something or someone.
Use wasn’t for singular subject and weren’t when the subject is plural, except when communicating in the subjunctive mood.
‘Was’ is for first-person and third-person singular subjects past tense, and ‘were’ for second-person and third-person plural subjects. With the subjunctive mood, use ‘were’ in all cases.
Both mistook and mistaken are past forms of the present tense verb, mistake. Mistook is the simple past tense, whereas mistaken is the past participle form.
The irregular verb mean only has one past verb form: meant. Meant is both the simple past tense and past participle form of the verb ‘mean’.
The past tense of lie down is lay down, and the past participle is lain. The past tense of lay (something) down on (something) is laid.