Verbs and types of Verbs II
Auxiliary Verbs (Helping
Verbs):
English verbs have only a limited
number of forms.
For example, the typical English verb write has the following forms: write, writes, wrote, written, writing.
But these forms are not always
sufficient to express all the meanings.
For example, ideas like questioning, negation,
time, repetition, completion, willingness, obligation etc. cannot be
expressed by using the simple forms of the verb.
In order to express these ideas, a number of helping or auxiliary verbs are added to other verbs.
There are two kinds of auxiliary verbs.
Ø Primary
Auxiliary:
There are three primary auxiliaries;
BE, Do and Have
·
Be is
added to other verbs to make continuous and passive verb forms.
Its forms
are am, is, are, was, were, been.
Examples:
§ He is writing. (Present continuous)
§
They were
singing. (Past continuous)
§ The dinner was cooked by my Dad. (Simple past
– passive)
·
Do has three
forms: do, does and did
Do is used to make questions,
negatives and emphatic sentence forms.
Examples:
§ Do you sing?
§
He doesn’t eat
meat.
§ Do come in.
·
Have is
used to make perfect verb forms.
Its
forms are: has, have and had
Examples:
§ What have you done?
§
Where has she
gone?
§ I realized that I hadn’t posted the letter.
Ø Modal
Auxiliary Verbs:
The verbs will, shall, would, should, can, could, may, might, must
and ought are called modal auxiliary verbs. Modal auxiliary verbs are used with other verbs to express different
degrees of certainty or obligation.
Examples:
§ She must have arrived.
§
You ought to help
him.
§ She said that she would help me.
NOTE: Modal Auxiliary
verbs are also known as Defective verb
because they cannot be used alone.
They are always used with the Action
Verbs.