What Are Verbs?

A verb is a "doing" word. A verb can express:

A physical action (e.g., to swim, to write, to climb).

A mental action (e.g., to think, to guess, to consider).

A state of being (e.g., to be, to exist, to appear).

Verbs Can Express Physical Actions

Here are some sentences with verbs that express physical actions. (In each example, the

verb is highlighted.)

She sells pegs and lucky heather.

sells

to sell

The doctor wrote the prescription.

wrote

to write

Alison bought a ticket.

bought

to buy

Verbs Can Express Mental Actions

While many verbs express physical actions (e.g., to jump, to dance, to sing), verbs can also express mental actions. For example:

She considers the job done.

considers

to consider

Peter guessed the right number.

guessed

to guess

I thought the same thing.

thought

to think

Verbs Can Express a State of Being

A small but extremely important group of verbs do not express any activity at all. The most important verb in this group (arguably of all) is the verb to be.

Here is the verb to be in the different tenses:

Subject	Verb to be
Subject	past tense	present tense	future tense
I	was	am	will be
You	were	are	will be
He / She / It	was	is	will be
We	were	are	will be
You	were	are	will be
They	were	are	will be

Here are some real examples with the verb to be:

Edwina is the largest elephant in this area.

to be

It was a joke.

was

to be