Make Irregular English Verbs Easier to Learn!

What Are Irregular Verbs? Over 180 English verbs are called irregular verbs, and they break all the rules. Most words in the English language follow the rules: today I use, yesterday I used. Past tense gets an -ed. Simple! Irregular verbs are a pain because there isn’t one rule you can learn for them. Irregular verbs are verbs that don’t take on the regular –d, -ed, or -ied spelling patterns of the past simple (V2) or past participle (V3). Many of the irregular V2 and V3 forms are the same, such as: cut – cut, had – had, let – let, hurt – hurt, fed- fed, sold-sold. They don’t follow the pattern. You just have to memorize them. It could be worse, though. Many years ago, Old English had twice as many irregular verbs as modern English. Over the years, these verbs and how we used them changed, and we ended up with our much simpler modern language. How to Recognize an Irregular English Verb? Knowing the history of irregular verbs is interesting, but it doesn’t help you learn them. To study irregular verbs, first you should understand what irregular verbs are. Regular verbs always follow the same pattern. They look the same in the past and are easy to form. Usually all you have to do is add the letters –ed at the end of the word! Here are some examples: I work, I worked, I had worked. He laughs, he laughed, he had laughed. Irregular verbs, though, don’t follow that pattern. You can recognize them because they look so different in the past tense. Some examples: I write, I wrote, I had written. He builds, he built, he had built. An English verb is irregular when it doesn’t end in -ed in the simple past and past participle tense. Not sure what those are? Here’s a simple way of looking at it:

• The simple past tensedescribes any action that takes place before right now.
  • Regular verb: I workedfor 40 hours last week.
  • Irregular verb:I spoke to my best friend yesterday.
• The past participle tenseis used to describe an action that happened and ended in the past.
  • Regular verb:I had worked for the company for only 6 months when I decided to leave.
  • Irregular verb:I had spoken at over 50 schools by the time I turned 30.

Irregular Verb Examples: Irregular verbs are also known as strong verbs. Here are nine that are used more often than the rest. These nine irregular verb examples also happen to be among the most commonly used words in the English language. They are:

• Go
• Get
• Say
• See
• Think
• Make
• Take
• Come
• Know

The following list of examples show how irregular verbs are used in sentences. Some sentences contain more than one example.

1. Go get your brother. It’s time to eat 

→ In this example, all three irregular verbs (go, get, and eat) are in base form.

2. I want to build a sand castle like the one we built last year.

→ In this example, the irregular verb build is in base form. The irregular verb built is the past simple form of “build”. When you look at the complete list of examples, you’ll notice that built is also the past participle of the irregular verb “build”.

3. He bet me that I couldn’t run five miles without stopping. I proved him wrong; I ran seven miles before I had to catch my breath.

→ In this example, bet is a past simple form. When you look at the complete list, you will see that all three forms of “bet” are the same. Next, in the same sentence, the irregular verb run is in base form. In the next sentence, ran is the past simple form of “run” and had is the past simple form of “have.” Meanwhile, catch is base form.

4. I awoke to find that a spider had bitten  Although the wound didn’t bleed, it itched terribly.

→ In this example, the irregular verb awoke is the past simple form of “awake.” Bitten is past participle form of “bite” and bleed is base form.

5. Let’s drink some of this lemonade. I drank some yesterday and found it delicious.

→ In this example, the irregular verb drink is in base form. Drank is the past simple form of “drink,” and found is the past simple form of “find.” Irregular Verb Exercises: Fill the blank spaces with the appropriate irregular verb.

1. My dog jumped out of the swimming pool and _____________ himself, causing water to spray everywhere. (shake, shook, shaken)
2. You should have ______________ Trish’s face when she got her surprise. (saw, had seen, seen)
3. We _____________ the whole day lounging on the beach. (spend, spent, had spend)
4. Let’s _____________ a hike on Saturday. (take, took, taken)
5. My brother Mike ______________ his stinky socks on the coffee table. (leave, left, leaving)
6. This is the ninth time that pitcher has _____________ a foul ball (throw, threw, thrown)
7. The water balloon _____________ when it hit its target. (burst, busted, broken)
8. Jesse intentionally ______________ gum in Jeff’s hair. (stick, stuck, sticky)

Answers: 1 – shook, 2 – seen, 3 – spent, 4 – take, 5 – left, 6 – thrown, 7- burst, 8 – stuck