Unit 3.2

Past Continuous Interrogative


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Introduction

The past continuous (or progressive) is the tense used to express situations that take place in the past and were in progress at any moment during a period of time.

When expressed in its interrogative form, it is used to ask questions about things that were happening in a past period of time.

Form

The past continuous, in its interrogative form, has this structure:
Was/Were + subject + [verb + -ing] + …?

  • Was/were: past simple of the verb to be.
Was/Were Subject Verb + -ing Question
Mark
Was I working ?
Were you working ?
Was he/she/it working ?
Were we/you/they working ?

Example

  • Was she reading a book when I called her?
  • Were they still watching TV when she returned from work at 7 o’clock?
  • Was he crossing the road?
  • Was she practising sport every day last year to prepare for the race?
  • Were they talking while the kids were playing?
  • Was her mother working on the laptop, her father watching TV and her sister studying when she went home?
  • Was I always going late to class?

Use

We use past continuous tense, in its interrogative form, to ask:

  • a longer background action interrupted by an unexpected shorter one (something suddenly happens while another longer event was already in progress);
  • an event that was occurring at an exact time in the past (expressing the date, hour or giving specific time information about an event in progress occurring at a past time);
  • an uninterrupted action which was in progress for a while (event in progress in the past during an extended period of time);
  • the length of time period in the past (event in progress in the past during an extended period of time);
  • past simultaneous actions (two events happened at the same time);
  • sequence of actions which occurred in the past (usually used to describe a situation in which different events were happening at the same time);
  • repeated or annoying action (with always or similar expressions that suggest the idea of a repeated event).

Summary

We use the past continuous, in the interrogative form, to ask for situations that occurred in the past and were in progress at every moment during a period of time.

When we use past continuous in its interrogative form, we start with was or were followed by the subject and the verb with -ing (the sentence ends with a question mark).

For example:
— “Was I playing football when the phone rang?” = We use past continuous to ask if something was interrupted when the phone rang.
♦ “Did I play football?” = We use past simple to ask about an action which started and concluded in the past.

Let’s revise this content within the {Form} section. Take a look at the {Example} section that shows its use within a context.

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