Main Verbs, Helping Verbs and Modal Auxiliaries
What are Main and Helping Verbs?
Let us read the following sentences.
1. Shashi brought home a little kitten.
2. Rita is serving dinner to her family.
The word which represents action in Sentence 1 is brought; however, in Sentence 2, one word alone does not represent the action. The phrase serves functions as the verb.
When we inspect this phrase, we see it is made of two elements. One word actually carries the main idea of the action, and the other word tells us more about the nature of the action. In the phrase, serving is the main verb. The word tells us more about the nature of the main action; hence, it is a helping verb.
Main Verbs
Main verbs are words which represent the primary or main action of the subject.
They contain the main meaning.
examples of main verbs:
The jockey is riding his horse.
Richard has finished his high school.
Harsh was going to the post office.
Helping Verbs
Helping verbs are words which support main verbs.
They are important to the structure of sentences.
They also tell us about the nature of the main verb with respect to tense and form.
They have little or no meaning as compared to the main verb.
examples of helping verbs are:
The phone is ringing.
The boys had been away for a long time.
The little dog had pleaded for a treat.
Primary Helping Verbs:
Primary helping verbs are helping verbs which can also function as main verbs. They can be divided into three categories.
1. Be forms (progressive helping verbs): Verbs like is, are, am, was, were are known as Be forms of helping verbs or progressive helping verbs. They tell us that the action expressed by the main verb is still in progression
Present progressive: Rashid is writing an essay for English class.
Past progressive: Greta was complaining to me about Greg.
Future progressive: His friends will be creating a ruckus in the college library
2. Have forms or perfect forms: Verbs like has, have, had are known as perfect forms of helping verbs. They tell us that the action expressed by the main verb is finished, complete or perfected
Present perfect: Dr Pavlov has fed his dog.
Past perfect: Kavita had informed the authorities.
Future perfect: Bianca will have completed three years in the office
3. Do forms: Helping verbs like do, does, did, done are known as do forms of helping verbs. They are used for
Emphasis: She does remember you.
Negation: Karim didn’t call me back as promised.
Forming questions: Did you park the car on the wrong side?
Modal Auxiliaries:
Modal auxiliaries or modal verbs are helping verbs which tell us about the modality or intent behind the verb’s performance.
These modalities include permission, suggestion, ability, probability or obligation.
Without the main verb, the auxiliary will not make sense at all.
| Modal | Tense | Meaning | Usage |
| Can | Present | Ability | Neha can play the piano |
| Can | Present
| Permission | Can I come in? |
Subject-Verb Agreement, Finite and Non-finite Verbs
What is a Subject-Verb Agreement?
Read the sentences:
1. The bear cub crawls.
2. The bear cubs crawl.
In Sentence 1, the subject ‘The bear cub’ agrees with the verb crawls. In Sentence 2, the subject The bear cubs agrees with the verb crawl. In Sentence 1, the subject is singular; hence, the verb is singular. In Sentence 2, the subject is plural; hence, the verb is also plural.
This agreement between the subject and the verb is known as subject verb agreement or subject verb concord. In simple words, we can say that when the subject is singular, the verb is singular; when the subject is plural, the verb is also plural.
| Subject | Verb |
| The dog | barks |
| The girl | loves |
| The groups | decided |
In the above examples, we can see that the subjects agree with their verbs with respect to number.
The subject of a sentence can be a noun, a pronoun or a gerund. The rules of agreement can be different for each.
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