went, saw, ate (irregular past)
The rebels of the past tense — and, unfairly, the most useful verbs of all. Went, saw, ate, had: collect them like dinosaurs.
From age 7Building sentences →
✏️ The pattern
- Saying it
- I went. She saw.
- Saying no
- I didn't go.
- Asking
- Did you see it?
- Short answer
- Yes, I did.
🗣️ Sentences a child can say
Tap any sentence to hear it. Every one uses words from a topic pack you already have.
🩹 What you will actually hear
The three mistakes that come up in every class, and what is behind each one.
I goed to the zoo.I went to the zoo.
Goed is beautiful logic applied to an outlaw verb — celebrate the thinking, then hand over the real form. Overgeneralising -ed is proof the rule was learned.
Did you went?Did you go?
Same law as -ed verbs: did takes the past for the whole sentence, and the main verb resets to base.
🎯 How to teach it
- 1
Five at a time, always the celebrity verbs first: went, saw, ate, had, got. These five carry half of every story a child wants to tell.
- 2
Play matching pairs with base and past forms — go/went is a memory-game pair, and the game format does the drilling for you.
- 3
Tell Monday stories in a circle: each child adds one sentence about the weekend using any past verb. Keep a scoreboard of new irregulars the class has 'caught'.
🗂️ Topic packs that pair with this
Same structure, words your class already knows — no new vocabulary needed.
💬 Questions teachers ask
How many irregular verbs does a Movers-age child need?
About twenty-five active ones cover the Cambridge Movers world. A printable card set and five minutes of matching a week keeps the collection alive without tears.
Should they memorise the classic three-column table?
Not at this age — the third column (gone, seen, eaten) belongs to the present perfect, years away. Two forms, learned inside sentences, are the honest scope.