1. The Imperfect Tense - saying what someone was doing

2. Use: to say was doing or used to do Form you need 3 things: 1.a subject 2.the stem 3.the correct ending

3. To form the stem: 1.decide on the infinitive you need 2.find the present tense of this verb 3.take the nous part 4.remove the –ons ending For example: allerallonsall

4. Now add the correct endings: ais ait ions iez aient je tu il / elle/ on nous vous ils/ elles

5. The only exception is… être êtrenous sommes BUT stem = ét For example: jétais – I was vous étiez – you were ils étaient – they were

6. Some examples I was doing – je faisais he was dancing – il dansait they were eating – ils mangeaient we were finishing – nous finissions you were selling – vous vendiez

7. A sneaky tip… For many –er and -re verbs you can simply remove the infinitive ending and then add the imperfect endings. BUT for –ir verbs you must add an -iss For example: vendre regarder finir je vendais je regardais je finissais