Past Simple Questions

by Ajmal Khan
(Wales)

What's the difference between the two uses of the past simple e.g. What did you do? and what you did?

Comments for Past Simple Questions

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Jan 10, 2011
 Answer
by: Ola Zur

Hello Ajmal,

1) When you want to ask a question, and this phrase is at the beginning of the sentence, you should use the first one:
"What did you do?"
"What did you do at home?"
"What did you do when the rain started?"
"What did you do today?"

2) When this phrase is not at the beginning of the question, or when it is not a question at all, you can use the second one:
"Do you know what you did?"
"What you did was wrong."
"I know what you did last summer."
"Now look what you did."

The reason for this is that in the simple present tense we always use the word DO to form questions. You can read about it at the Simple Present Rules page.

Ola Zur is the editor of www.really-learn-english.com, an illustrated guide to English.

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