Grammar Guide | Basic Grammar
Main Verbs and Helping Verbs
Your Complete Guide to Using Understanding Main Verbs and Helping Verbs.
Main verbs carry the core meaning of a sentence, showing the action or state of being, while helping verbs (also called auxiliary verbs) team up with them to express tense, mood, voice, and possibility. Explore our lessons and examples to learn how to spot each type, understand how they work together in phrases like “She has been studying” or “They will arrive,” and use verb phrases with confidence in your own writing.
Finding Verbs in Sentences: The Subject-Verb Detective Strategy
Here’s the secret to identifying verbs: you can’t find the verb until you find the subject. They’re a package deal. Once you know who or what the sentence is about,...
The 23 Helping Verbs: Your Complete List (And When You Actually Need Them)
Here’s the thing about helping verbs: there are only 23 of them. That’s it. Once you memorize this list, you’ll be able to spot helping verbs anywhere—and more importantly, you’ll...
Main Verbs vs. Helping Verbs: When Your Verb Needs Backup
Pop quiz: In the sentence “I am studying for finals,” what’s the verb? If you said “studying,” you’re close—but not quite there. The full verb is actually “am studying”—a combo...