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Helping verbs are found before a main verb in a sentence, helping the verb to make it a progressive sentence.

In a Past progressive sentence: He was going to the park.

"Was" is the helping verb.

In a present progressive sentence: I am going to the park.

"Am" is the helping verb.

In a future progressive sentence: She will be going to the park.

"Will" and "Be" are the helping verbs.

Helping verbs:

is

am

are

was

were

be

being

been

has

have

had

do

does

did

shall

will

should

would

may

might

must

can

could

are words that "help" the verb, such as:

She had run Into the Woods.

'Had' is the helping verb, while 'run' is the action (main)verb. If you left out the word 'had', the sentence would be "She run into the woods", which would then be grammatically incorrect.

Now, if the sentence was "She ran into the woods" the helping verb 'had' would then cause the sentence "She had ran into the woods" to be grammatically incorrect.

A good way to remember this is to try the sentences with the proper verb tense and then try it with the wrong verb tense. That should help you distinguish the correct form from the incorrect one.

A helping verb does not have to occur immediately before a main verb -- it can also occur before another helping verb. In "She will have been going to the park", there are three helping verbs: "will" (a modal auxiliary), "have" (the perfect auxiliary), and "been" (the perfect participle form of the progressive auxiliary). And all three of these can also occur with yet another auxiliary verb: the passive be, as in "She will have been being followed for hours."

Also, "helping verbs" can occur independently, with no verb that they help. We can tell this because auxiliary verbs, unlike true verbs, can be inverted in yes-no questions: "Will she go?/Has she gone?/Is she going?", and the auxiliaries "have", "be" are still inverted, even when they have no following main verb: "Is she here?/Have you any wool?".

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12y ago

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