There are the following of ways to transform simple present progressive tense which has auxiliary + verb-ing can be presented as
follow: a. To transform affirmative sentence into negative sentence with
the subject “I”, use or add to be “am + not + verb-ing”, the subject “we, they, you”, use or add to be “are+not + verb-ing”
after subjects. E.g.:I am studying English.
I am not studying English. You are writing a poem.
You are not writing a poem. b. To transform affirmative sentence into negative sentence with
the subject “he, she, it”, use or add to be “is + not + verb-ing” after subjects.
E.g.: He is swimming now. He is not swimming now.
She is reading magazine. She is not reading magazine.
c. To transform declarative statement into interrogative statement yesno question move auxiliary on the beginning of
sentence and put a question mark ? at the end of sentence. E.g.: They are selling vegetables.
Are they selling vegetables?
He is teaching math. Is he teaching math?
D. The Simple Past Tense 1.
The Understanding of Simple Past Tense
English insists on marking every finite verb group for absolute tense, whether or not the time orientation would be clear without it. Many other
languages, however, often do not require such marking of the verb group where the time location is either unimportant or is clear from the context.
This may partly explain why some learners of English tend
According to A. J. Thomson and A. V. Martinet, the simple past tense is defined as the action completed in the past at definite time.
27
In addition, Eugene J. Hall stated that simple past tense indicates a past action that
occurred at definite time in the past, whether that time is stated or not.
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The simple past tense is formed with the past form of the verb which may be either regular, by adding
–ed to infinitive form incidentally, most verbs are regular or irregular which must be learned and memorized in each
case.
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For example: “She played volleyball yesterday” or “She ate a bowl
of soup last week. ”
Betty S. Azar described that simple past tense can formulate in diagram as follow:
Now
Certain Time Past
Future
From the diagram above she described that simple past tense indicates that an activity or situation began and ended at a particular time in
the past.
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From those several statement above, the writer concluded that the
simple past tense is used to express a definite event in the past. Simple past
tense is also used if the event happened completely in the past even the time is not mentioned.
2. The Rules of Using Present Progressive Tense
27
A. J. Thomson and A. V. Martinet, A Practical English Grammar, 4
th
ed, New York: Oxford University Press, 1986, p. 147
28
Eugene J. Hall, Grammar for Use, Jakarta: Binarupa Aksara, 1993, p. 173
29
Nasrun Mahmud, English for Muslim University Students, Jakarta: Pusat Bahasa dan Budaya UIN, 2003, p. 88
30
Betty S. Azar, Understanding and Using English Grammar, 2
nd
ed, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1989, p. 24
