ESL Grammar WorksheetsPast Continuous Questions

Past Continuous Questions

This ESL worksheet on Past Continuous questions is ideal for teens and adults at the B1 level. It offers a practical and engaging way to master how to form and use Past Continuous in various types of questions—open (Wh-), closed (Yes/No), and embedded in storytelling or background scenarios. Learners will work through structured tasks such as sentence reordering, question rewriting, error correction, and detective-style roleplay to strengthen their understanding. With a special focus on recognizing when not to use the tense (e.g., with stative verbs), this worksheet is perfect for students aiming to ask and answer questions fluently and accurately in narrative past contexts.

B1 (Intermediate)Teens Adults Past Continuous Free

Online Interactive

Based on CEFR

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Study this grammar rule.

The Past Continuous tense is used to describe actions or situations that were in progress at a specific moment in the past. It helps to set the scene in storytelling or to show that an action was ongoing when another action occurred. When to use Past Continuous questions: 1: To ask about an action that was happening at a particular time in the past. Example: What were you doing at 8 o'clock last night? 2: To inquire about a background action that was interrupted by another action. Example: What were they talking about when you arrived? 3: To ask about simultaneous actions that were happening at the same time. Example: What were you and your friends doing while I was cooking? Exceptions or Things to Pay Attention To: The Past Continuous is not used with stative verbs (verbs that describe a state rather than an action) such as "know," "believe," or "like." Example: You would not say, "What were you knowing?" Instead, you would ask, "What did you know at that time?"

Require students to provide an answer