Present Participle

Present Participle is a form of Verb ending with -ing and they express the continuous actions of the Nouns and/or Pronouns. Present Participles act as Adjectives as well. With the help of necessary Auxiliary Verbs, Present Participles grace the sentences of Continuous and Perfect Continuous tenses.

Examples:

• They are studying for the examination.

“Studying” is the Present Participle form of the Verb - “Study”.

More Examples:

• You have been looking out of the window for ten whole minutes.
• He is a screaming
• He is asking for you.

How to form Present Participles?

All Present Participles end with -ing so they are formed by adding -ing at the tail of each verb’s base form.

Examples:

• Invest > Investing
• Deal > Dealing
• Act > Acting

Base verbs ending with -y follow the same rule, and must not be confused with other word-formation methods where the “y” gets dropped while any suffix is added.

Examples:

• Dry > Drying
• Lay > Laying
• Try > Trying

Verbs ending with -ie must drop it and add a “y” before adding the -ing to turn into Present Participles.

Examples:

• Tie > Tying
• Die > Dying
• Lie > Lying
• Vie > Vying

Verbs ending with -e drop it before -ing is added in its place.

Examples:

• Write > Writing
• File > Filing
• Pipe > Piping

Base forms of verbs that end with consonant-vowel-consonant must double the ending consonant before adding the -ing.

Examples:

• Format > Formatting
• Trot > Trotting
• Run > Running

Present Participles as Verb Tenses

Present Participles are used in continuous tenses after respective Auxiliary Verbs. Continuous and Perfect Continuous Tenses signify the continuous state of verbs in Present, Past and Future Tenses. This would be the prime use of Present Participles.

Present Participles as Adjectives

Present Participles at times take the responsibility of describing the state of the Subject and that makes them act as Adjectives in those sentences.

Examples:

Present Participle Phrases

These are phrases starting with Present Participles (Verbs ending with “-ing”). In the case of these phrases too, Present Participles express the continuous state or action.

Formation:

(Present Participle) + the rest = Present Participle Phrase

In the Present Participle phrase, “Growing with age” starts with the Present Participle - “Growing” where the “ing” turns the Verb into Present Participle.

More Examples:

• Rising from the ashes, the phoenix took flight.
• The boat kept moving ahead piercing the water.
• Commuting in the varsity bus helped me stick to my monthly budget.