This document discusses the imperfect progressive tense in Spanish. The imperfect progressive, formed with the imperfect tense of estar plus a present participle, is used to describe an action that was ongoing or taking place over a period of time in the past. Some examples of using the imperfect progressive are provided, such as "Estaba esquiando cuando me caí" (I was skiing when I fell). The formation of present participles from stem-changing and spelling-changing verbs in -er and -ir is also reviewed.

1. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
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Realidades 2

2. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• Do you remember the present
progressive?
• It’s used when a person wants to
say that an action is happening
“right now.”

3. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• It uses the present tense of estar +
the present participle (ando/iendo).
• No puedo ir al cine. Estoy
estudiando para el examen.

4. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• To describe something that was taking
place over a period of time in the past,
use the imperfect progressive, which
uses the imperfect tense of estar + the
present participle (ando/iendo).

5. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• Estaba esquiando cuando me caí
y me torcí la rodilla.
• I was skiing when I fell and
sprained my knee.

6. Estar--imperfect
Estaba estábamos
Estabas X
Estaba estaban

7. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• The present and imperfect progressive
tenses use the same irregular present
participles.

8. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• Remember, to form the present
participle of -ir stem-changing verbs, e
changes to i and o changes to u:

9. E > I
decir?
diciendo
pedir?
pidiendo
repetir?
repitiendo
seguir?
siguiendo
servir?
sirviendo
vestir?
vistiendo

10. O > U
dormir?
durmiendo

11. I > Y
• For the following -er verbs, the I of
-iendo changes to y:
• creer?
• creyendo
• leer?
• leyendo
• traer?
• trayendo

12. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• When you use pronouns with the
imperfect progressive, you can put
them before estar or attach them to
the participle.

13. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• ¿Qué estabas haciendo cuando te
cortaste?
• Estaba afeitándome.
• Or
• Me estaba afeitando.

14. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• Note that the imperfect progressive
describes what was taking place while
the preterite tells a specific occurance
in the past or interrupts the action.

15. Imperfect Progressive and
Preterite
• Ella estaba corriendo cuando se
lastimó el tobillo.