We learned about the base form of verbs. Now in this post we will learn what are helping verbs. A verb can consist of more than one word. In such cases, there is one base verb and the rest are called the auxiliary or the helping verbs. Following is the list of the auxiliary verbs:
is, are, am, was, were, has, have, had, has/have/had been, can/could, may/might, will/would, shall/should.
Let’s take a few sentences here:
- The president is still deliberating on the issues of economic crisis.
In this sentence, “deliberating” is the base verb. But it alone does not make a verb in this sentence. The preceding helping verb “is” makes them together the verb.
- Mike has been working on his project.
In this sentence, “working” is the base verb. But the complete verb here is “has been working” where “has been” are the helping verb without which the base verb cannot be regarded as a verb.
Also notice that when we use do/does/did, it is always followed by a base verb. The number of the helping verb depends upon the number of the subject. For example:
- The flower does not bloom well in windy weather.
Notice that “the flower” is the singular subject. That is why the auxiliary verb used for this subject is singular “does”. Since we have already used one singular verb in the sentence, the verb that follows the helping verb is in the base form. Even if the subject is singular, we cannot say “does not blooms”. If this sentence is written without the helping verb, then the main verb will follow the number of the subject:
- The flower blooms in windy weather.
In past tense sentences, if the helping verb “did” is used, then it is also flowed by the base verb. We cannot use past tense verb with “did”. For example:
- The flower did not bloom in windy weather. Correct.
- The flower did not bloomed in windy weather. Incorrect.
