BE Verb

Week:01

In this lesson, you will learn about the BE Verb. What is the BE verb? Well, BE is a verb to start with. Remember a verb is an action word like cook, laugh, drink and dance.

BE is a verb but it is not an action word. I am sure you hear the BE verb all of the time. In fact, these sentences are full of the BE verb. Let's look is, is a form of the BE verb.

I am is also the BE verb and are is also a form of BE. Let's look at the verb chart for BE in the simple present. Here is a chart with the pronouns and here are the forms of the BE verb. I am, you are, he is, she is, it is, we are, you are and they are.

You can see there are 3 forms of the BE verb. Other verbs only have 2 forms, but BE is always different. You can see that BE is strange because none of these forms look like BE. There's no letter BE in any of them. Also notice that the plural forms are all the same word. When do we use the BE verb? Let's look at this sentence, Mark drinks water, Mark is the subject of the sentence. The subject does the action drinks is the action, drinks is the verb in the sentence, Mark is the subject because he drinks. Okay, now let's look at this sentence. The water is cold.

What is the subject? Water, right? So water is the subject and what does water do what action does water do? Nothing? Water doesn't do anything in this sentence. Water just is, this is when we use the BE verb in English, we need a verb but there is no action. So we use the BE verb to connect the subject to the rest of the sentence. The water is cold, is is the verb, and we use the BE verb to connect to the adjective cold. We need a verb. Let's look at some examples.

Kate is a scientist. Kate is in a laboratory.

Kate is smart. In the first sentence, Kate is the subject, is is the BE verb that connects the subject to a noun scientist that tells more about Kate.

In the 2nd sentence, Kate is the subject is is the form of the BE verb that connects Kate to the rest of the sentence here, it's a noun, a place. In the 3rd sentence. Again, Kate is the subject is is the BE verb, that connects Kate to the rest of the information here. An adjective that describes her Kate is smart.

BE connects the subject to information about the subject. Here is Mark again. Mark is a runner. Mark is the subject is is the BE verb and a runner is more information about Mark. BE is the verb that connects the information to the subject when there really isn't any action. Here the more information is a noun runner but we can change the sentence. Mark is thirsty. Now the information is an adjective. Mark is at a park. Now that information is at a place Mark is from California. Also a place from a place BE connects the subject to information about the subject when there isn't really an action happening. If you say to me, my friend Diana, an engineer, I understand more or less what you're saying but the grammar is incorrect. We need the BE verb to connect the subject to the non engineer. My friend Diana is an engineer. We need the BE verb for the sentence to be correct. If you say this strawberry is very sweet. I understand but the grammar is incorrect. There is no verb in the sentence and every sentence needs a verb. So we use the BE verb. The strawberries are sweet and here are is the BE verb that connects the strawberries to the adjective sweet.

In some languages you can say Frank in the kitchen and everybody understands. But in English this doesn't work. We say frank is in the kitchen because we need that BE verb. Here's one more example. Can you see what is wrong? It is missing a BE verb. What form of BE should go here am I am from California. This is correct grammar.

There are 3 forms of BE in the present but we have more than three pronouns. In this chart.

Am always goes with I and only I but look at our our goes with you, we and they and is could be, he is, she is or it is. This is why we always need a subject in every sentence in English. Let's look at an example. In English, we need a subject in every sentence. In some languages you can say are interesting but in English we don't know what you mean. You are interesting, we are interesting. They are interesting, since there are only 3 forms of BE. We need to include a subject in every sentence. Are interesting is incorrect. Languages are interesting.

Okay, let's look at one more thing about the verb to BE. We can use a contraction. Look at these two sentences, she is a student and she's a student. They sound almost the same. We see the BE verb is in the first sentence. In the second sentence, there is just an S this is called a contraction.

A contraction is 2 words in 1. This mark here, this mark is an apostrophe and we use it in contractions, combine the pronoun and BE to make a contraction. Let's do it. Look at I am. So when I am we dropped the A. We move the m a little closer and we add an apostrophe. I'm you are. Again we drop the a here, we push it a little closer and we add an apostrophe. Your, he is, she is, it is, followed the same pattern. So drop the I move the s closer to make one word and put in the apostrophe.

She's, it's follow the same pattern as he's. We are changes to where you are, changes to your and they are changes to their. Fill in the blanks. Let's practice. Maybe you want to pause the recording and try to fill in the blanks yourself. Okay, are you ready for the answers?

Amy and Lynn, are friends. Amy is from California. Lynn is from Colorado. Amy and Lynn are college students. In this photo they are happy because they are on a camping trip together. In this lesson, you learned a lot about the BE verb. You learned BE is a verb. We use BE to connect the subject to more information like a noun, adjective or place.

There are 3 forms of BE in the simple present am, is, are and we make contractions with BE. I'm, he's and there.