present continuous

Did you know that there are some verbs you cannot use in the continuous tense? Find out which verbs they are in this exercise in our Basics series.

There's no time like the present! We use the present continuous to talk about something that is happening now: "It's raining."  We use the present simple to talk about general truths: "It rains a lot in Scotland."

"Are you learning English?" We make the present continuous with am / is / are and the -ing form of the verb. We use this tense to talk about things that are happening at the moment.

They don't agree on food culture, but they speak to the same crowd: Jamie Oliver says "It's smelling delicious" and McDonald's use "I'm lovin' it" in their advertisements. Never mind their slang. Just say "It smells delicious" and "I love it".

In Walt Disney's "Alice in Wonderland", Alice meets a group of men who are doing something very strange. They don't always do it, do they? Watch a video and review the grammar rules for the present simple and the present continuous.

One of the core elements of any language is its tense system. In English the tenses have two important aspects, the simple form and the continuous form. Do you know the tenses?