Your list
How many irregular past forms did you write down last night? Read them out.
Your teacher will tick the ones that are on this unit's list of thirty. Most people already have more than half.
Four sentences where a regular rule has been applied to an irregular verb. Rewrite each one.
1. I goed there every summer.
2. She taked the train.
3. We thinked about it for a year.
4. He breaked his arm on the rocks.
They are not random
Thirty verbs look like thirty things to memorise. They are closer to six.
Look for the pattern before you read the row labels
| Group | Base → Past | And also |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | bring → brought | think → thought · buy → bought · teach → taught · catch → caught |
| 2 | keep → kept | sleep → slept · feel → felt · leave → left · mean → meant |
| 3 | drink → drank | begin → began · swim → swam · sing → sang · ring → rang |
| 4 | speak → spoke | break → broke · choose → chose · steal → stole · wake → woke |
| 5 | cut → cut | put → put · let → let · hit → hit · cost → cost |
| 6 | go → went | be → was/were · do → did · have → had — no pattern at all |
Answer from the table.
1. Group 1 — what do all five past forms end in?
2. Group 3 and Group 4 both change a vowel. What is the difference?
3. Group 5 is the easiest. Why?
4. So how many patterns do you actually have to learn?
Group them yourself
Match each verb to the group it belongs to. One of them belongs to the group with no pattern.
Put the six groups in order, from the one that takes the least effort to learn to the one that takes the most.
Retrieve them, not recognise them
Reading a verb list feels like learning. It is not. Producing the form from memory is.
Write the past simple of the verb in brackets. Do not look at Phase 03 — the whole value is in retrieving it.
We (leave) at six and (take) the first bus. I (sleep) most of the way. When we arrived my sister (buy) coffee and we (sit) outside for an hour. Nobody (speak) much. I (think) about turning round and going home, and then I (feel) ridiculous and we (go) on.
Six sentences. Some regularise an irregular; some mark the past twice. Rewrite each one in full.
1. I bringed my camera but I forgot the charger.
2. She sleeped on the floor for three weeks.
3. Did you went back?
4. We didn't took the train.
5. He beginned working there in 2015.
6. They putted everything in one box.
Twenty questions, all in the past
Task card · Speaking
Your teacher is thinking of a journey they took. You have to work out what it was.
Ask twenty yes/no questions in the past simple. Every question needs did, and every main verb after it stays bare.
- Did you go by train? Did you sleep there? Did you take anyone with you?
- Then swap: you think of a journey and they ask.
- Count how many irregular verbs you use across the twenty. Target: at least eight different ones.
Two questions to get right before the twenty.
1. Which question is correct?
2. And the answer, if the answer is no?
How many stuck
Compare with the list you brought last night.
1. How many irregular verbs did you use in the twenty questions?
2. Which group is still not automatic?
Before the long turn
Thirty seconds. Four verbs, four past forms.
Before Lesson 5. Next lesson you talk for three minutes without stopping, about one place that matters to you. Choose which of your four it will be, and nothing else.
Do not write anything. Do not rehearse. Choosing is the whole preparation — a rehearsed three minutes measures nothing.