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Life Upper Intermediate Unit 2b

Past perfect simple and past perfect continuous

He’d been working hard all his life. He’d had a lot of different jobs. He’d worked as a truck driver, a builder
and a car mechanic, but now it was time to retire. He’d always wanted to travel, so he’d bought himself a
motorbike and now he and his dog were going to travel around the world!

Presentation
Past perfect continuous Past perfect continuous or past perfect simple?
Use the past perfect continuous to talk about an action Use the past perfect simple to talk about:
that was in progress before a given time in the past: • single, complete events: He’d worked as a truck driver.
He had been working hard all his life, but now it was He’d bought a bike.
time to retire. • repeated actions when we give the number of times
the action is repeated: He’d done a lot of different jobs
in his lifetime.
time

he’d been working hard he retired time

he did a lot of different jobs    he decided to retire   he retired


It is possible that the action (working hard) finished before
he retired, or at that point in time. It is also possible that
it continued: he had been working hard all his life, and he Use the past perfect continuous to talk about how long
had no intention of stopping, even after he’d retired. an action, or series of actions, was in progress:
To form the past perfect continuous use: He had been working hard all his life.
had 1 been 1 verb 1 -ing He’d been riding his bike for five hours without stopping.
Affirmative and negative You don’t usually use stative verbs in the past perfect
I/You/He/She/It/ ’d/had/ working
continuous.
been
We/They hadn’t hard. Say I had known him for years. (don’t say I had been
knowing him for years.)
Questions and answers See Unit 3: Stative verbs in the continuous
I/you/he/she/it/ working See page 235: Summary of past perfect simple and past
Had been
we/they hard? perfect continuous

Yes, had.
I/you/he/she/it/we/they
No, hadn’t.

Practical Grammar 3 1 © National Geographic Learning


Upper Intermediate Unit 2b
Exercises

1 Look at the pictures and complete the sentences using the past perfect continuous of the verbs
in the box.

cry not listen not live work

1 She was exhausted. She had been working 3 The baby all night. It
all night. was six o’clock and he hadn’t had any sleep.

2 He had no idea what the answer was. He 4 She there very long,
to the teacher. but she already felt totally at home.
2 Look at the pictures in exercise 1 and complete the questions using the past perfect continuous.
1 How long ? All night. 3 What all night? Crying!
2 to the teacher? No, he 4 How long there? Not
hadn’t. very long.
3 Choose the correct form of the verbs to complete the story.
1 He’d never fallen / been falling in love before. 5 She’d seen / been seeing him for a few weeks.
She was his first love. 6 He hadn’t realised / been realising what was
2 They’d gone / been going out together for a happening.
couple of months. 7 Then one day, he’d seen / been seeing the two of
3 Then she’d started / been starting making them walking down the street hand in hand.
excuses so as not to see him. 8 And he understood that she’d found / been
4 She’d met / been meeting another man at a finding a new boyfriend.
party a few weeks earlier.
4  Complete the text using the past perfect simple or past perfect continuous form of the verbs
in brackets. Then listen and check.
We 1 (work) for the same company for a couple of months. I 2 (see) her
in the distance and I 3
(notice) how attractive she was, but we 4 (never/
speak). Then, while we 5 (do) a training course together, we finally got to know each other.
We 6 (have) a drink with the other people on the course at the end of the first day, and we
7
(all/talk) about how difficult it was. I 8 (not notice) that she was standing just
behind me. I laughed at one of the jokes, stepped back and spilt her drink down her dress! I 9
(never/feel) so embarrassed in my life. But she was really nice about it. I bought her another drink and we got
talking. She told me she 10 (just/buy) a house on my street and that she 11
(spend) her weekends painting and decorating. I offered to help her. That’s how it all started!

Practical Grammar 3 2 © National Geographic Learning

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