yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

Helping verbs | The parts of speech | Grammar | Khan Academy


2m read
·Nov 11, 2024

Hello, Garans.

Now, we've already talked about how verbs can show actions and link concepts, and today I'd like to talk about a third function of the verb, which is helping other verbs. Now, we call this the helping verb. You may have heard it called that, or the auxiliary verb, and these are just two words for the same thing. Auxiliary is just a more Latin way to say helping; that's all it means.

Now, I've brought along an image of my friend Brian to help explain this principle. What helping verbs are is really just inflected forms of the verbs "to have" and "to be." As we get deeper into the verb, I'll explain what each one means in each one of its different versions. But for now, suffice it to say that I'm just going to throw out some examples just so you can see what it means for a helping verb to be a helping verb.

The specific way in which helping verbs help is that they establish certain facts about a sentence, usually when they're happening in time. We'll get more and more into that as we get more into tenses and aspect, but I just want to give you some examples.

So here we have Brian is eating a pizza. Brian and I love pizza; we used to eat a lot of pizza. Brian has eaten a pizza. Brian was eating a pizza. And finally, Brian had been eating a pizza.

So the presence of all these helping verbs has different effects depending on which ones you use. As I said, we'll get into those later, but just for a brief overview, for example, um, let's see. Brian is eating a pizza; that suggests that it's going on now. Brian has eaten a pizza; that means he had done it; it's over in the past. Brian was eating a pizza, which means he was in the middle of eating a pizza when something happened. And finally, Brian had been eating a pizza, so he was doing it, and then he stopped at some point in time.

This is just the most basic introduction to helping verbs. So, verbs can show actions, verbs can link concepts, and verbs can help other verbs. You can learn anything!

David out.

More Articles

View All
Blacksmith for Barter | Live Free or Die
Gonna be a hot one today in the mountains of Colorado. Primitive blacksmith Derik fires up his forge to nearly 2500 degrees, the ideal temperature to mold iron. Today I’m gonna continue working on my camp set, try to finish that out—four more pieces beca…
2015 AP Calculus BC 2b | AP Calculus BC solved exams | AP Calculus BC | Khan Academy
[Voiceover] Part b. “For zero is less than t is less than one, there is a point on the curve at which the line tangent to the curve has a slope of two.” The line tangent to the curve has a slope of two. “At what time is the object at that point?” So, the …
Input approach to determining comparative advantage | AP Macroeconomics | Khan Academy
In other videos, we have already looked at production possibility curves and output tables in order to calculate opportunity costs of producing a certain product in a certain country. Then we use that to think about comparative advantage. We’re going to d…
Light Pollution 101 | National Geographic
[Narrator] The invention of the electric light bulb, 150 years ago, was one of the most transformative milestones in history. This new form of light, artificial light, brightened and made safe once-dark streets, prolonged waking hours into the evening, an…
Unraveling a Mapmaker’s Dangerous Decision | Podcast | Overheard at National Geographic
So I told them that they didn’t have a chance, and for the sake of their wives and children, they should vacate the area and go back. Both of them sunk, and at that time I heard the cocking of weapons. Once both of them cocked their weapons, I knew they m…
His Epic Message Will Make You Want to Save the World | Short Film Showcase
Fun fact: Planet Earth is 4.5 billion years old. Mankind is about 140,000 years old. Let me put that in perspective. If you condense the Earth’s lifespan into 24 hours, that’s one full day. Then we have been here on this planet for, drum roll please, 3 se…