Harvey's Elementary Grammar and Composition · Lesson Appendix · Part 3: Part III: Punctuation, and the Appendix
95. Irregular and unipersonal verbs
Goal: Your child knows where to look up irregular verbs and can give the principal parts of the most common ones.
You'll need
- The book, open to this lesson
- Paper and a pencil (or a slate)
What's in the book
The Appendix lists the principal parts of most irregular verbs in three columns (present, past, perfect participle), marking those that also have regular forms. It ends with unipersonal verbs like "It snows."
The lesson, step by step
Review
Ask: What are the three principal parts of a verb?
Using the list
Read:
The following list contains the Principal Parts of most of the irregular verbs.
Those marked r have also the regular forms.
Show your child how to find a verb in the list.
Oral practice
Say ten common verbs from the list (begin, choose, go, see, take, write, swim, steal, bring, catch). Your child gives the past and perfect participle, then checks the list.
Write sentences
For three tricky verbs, write a sentence with the past form and one with the perfect participle: "I swam." "I have swum."
Unipersonal verbs
Read:
A Unipersonal Verb is one by which an act or state is asserted independently of any particular subject;
The book's examples: "It snows;" "It behooves us to be watchful." It also says the name need not be used in parsing.
Use it today
Keep this list handy. Whenever your child is unsure of a past form, look it up together.
Answers to the book's problems
begin, began, begun; choose, chose, chosen; go, went, gone; see, saw, seen; take, took, taken; write, wrote, written; swim, swam, swum; steal, stole, stolen; bring, brought, brought; catch, caught, caught. Check others against the book's list.
Worked out for this site from the scan. If a number in your copy differs, trust the book.