How to differentiate between Past tense and Past Participle.pdf

Read and learn about how these differences impact sentences and the way you use them.

1. How to differentiate between Past tense
and Past Participle?

In the English language, we often add time in tenses to describe the event that is happening, has
happened, or will be happening in the future. In this way, we get three main forms of tenses, i.e.,
present tense, past tense, and future tense. Here we have discussed different aspects of past tense
and how it differs from the past participle.
Read and learn about how these differences impact sentences and the way you use them from
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2. What are tenses?
In English, we use the verbs in different forms to state the time of different actions that are
happening or happened. One single verb can be changed to demonstrate different times. Let’s
take a look at this with an example of three types of tenses.
• Past tense.
• Present tense.
• Future tense.
If we are talking about a person with the action of “writing,” we can change the verb in three forms
to describe three different times.
Past tense: I wrote an article last night.
Present tense: I am writing an article.
Future tense: I will be writing an article tomorrow.
In this way, the verb was changed to three different forms, stating three times related to the action
of writing.
Let’s discuss different aspects of the past tense.

3. Past tense
When the form of a verb in tenses is used to describe an action, a situation, or any event that has
happened already in the past is referred to as past tense. Usually, the suffix ed is added to the
present form of the verb, which turns it into past tense.
Usually, the past tense is used in four different types, as discussed below:
1. Simple past tense.
2. Past continuous tense.
3. Past perfect tense.
4. Past perfect continuous.
Simple past tense
Simple past is used to simply state the event or action that has happened in the past. However, the
ed suffix is added to the form of the verb to turn it into simple past tense. There are some verbs like
put or set that do not change to any form, thus remain the same.
For example:
I worked for an estate agent last year.
She cut the cake yesterday.
Past continuous tense
This is the type of past tense that is used to describe an event that has happened in the past, and it is
also ongoing. For this purpose, usually, the form of a verb, i.e., Was/Were, is used with the verb with
suffix, ing.
For example:
He was drinking coffee upstairs.
I was reading my novel when she called me downstairs.
Past perfect tense
This is the type of past tense that is used to describe an action or an event that has occurred before
an action or event in the past. The main purpose of this type of past tense is to make clear which of
the two happening events occurred first.
For example:
I had gone to the bookstore before I came home.
She had saved money for buying the car.

4. Past Perfect Continuous Tense
This is the type of past tense that is used to describe an event or action that happened in the past
before another event stopped it. In other words, when one past event is interrupted by another, then
we describe it by the use of this type of past tense.
For example:
I had been cleaning the pool since morning.
She had been roaming in the street for two hours.
Past participle
As we have discussed the detailed aspects related to the past tense, let’s discuss past participles
now.
The past participle is basically the form of the verb that has suffix ed added to it, and it is used to
describe an event that has happened in the past.
Usually, the past participle form of the verb is used with a form of helping verb like had, has, have
been. In this way, the past participle is used as a passive voice and adjective as well sometimes.
We usually add the word “ed” after the verb when we are writing past participles. For example, they
screamed.
Through a slight difference, we can turn the simple past tense verb into a past participle.
Let’s suppose there is a word that could be sleep, study, or jump.
To change these words into a simple past tense, we will add the suffix ed, t, or d at the end, and it
will become Slept, studied, and jumped.
In the third step, to turn these simple past tense verbs into a past participle, we will add a helping
verb with which will turn these into:
I have slept, have studied, and have jumped.
In this way, the words turned into simple past tense verbs and the past participle.
For example:
He has gone to the school
I have
Difference between Past Tense and Past
Participle
The main difference between the past tense and past participle is minor yet big. Basically, the past
tense is associated with a whole tense, whereas the past participle is associated with a specific form
of the verb.

5. The mixing up of the past tense and participle can sometimes go unnoticed by people because
they tend to ignore the form of a verb that should be rightly used.
Suppose we are talking about a place or thing we saw. then saying I seen that jar (past tense) would
seem wrong instead of simply saying I saw that jar (past participle)
While past tense is used to describe a certain action or event that happened in the past, past
participle, on the other hand, is simply a form of the verb that can not be used alone. It is usually
used in some kind of tense to describe a certain event.
When we add a past participle to a sentence, we use a helping verb along with it, and in the past
tense, we can simply write the form of the verb without any helping verb, as shown in the following
examples.
I ate a sandwich in the morning. (Past tense)
I had eaten a sandwich in the morning. (Past participle)
The past participle can also be used in the form of an adjective as stated in the example below:
We talked about this movie last night. (Past tense)
This movie has been talked about a lot. (Past participle)
Conclusion
We use tenses to describe a certain event that has either happened, is happening, or will be
happening. In this way, there are three main tenses that are past, present, and future, respectively.
On the other hand, we have past participle that is a form of the verb used with another helping
verb to form up certain tenses. The past participle is also used as an adjective sometimes.
Learn all about the tenses and their usage from our expert and certified private English tutors.