Yes, would is past tense form of will.
For example a past habit:
The dog would wait by the gate every afternoon, for his master to come home.
The past tense of refer is referred.
The past tense of refer is referred.
The sentence "others refer to them as giant rivers of ice" is in the present tense. The past tense would have used referred, the future tense would have used, will refer.
The noun forms of the verb to refer are referrer, reference, referral, and the gerund, referring.
If you are asked 'How was your day?' then you would respond in past tense.
Education is a noun. It does not have a tense. However, you can say that someone was educated. That would be the past tense of the verb educate.
The past tense is used to refer to something that has already happened. The present tense is used to refer to something that is currently happening. The future tense is used to refer to things that have not yet happened but will happen in the future.
Referred.
The past tense of "will" is "would". The past tense of "to be" is "was" or "were".
Something that took place in the past.
Would is the past tense of will.
Would is the past tense of will.