The present continuous tense is also called the progressive tense. In English it is used for talking about an action that is happening now or action that will happen in the future.
Example of an action happening now you can say or write:
For an action that is expected or planned to take place in the future.
You can also say: David is going to lay the carpet in the bedroom tomorrow.
We can use the present continuous tense to talk about the future by adding the words: tomorrow, next year, in November (the next November), Carnival, Christmas (when these occasions have not arrived yet). The thing to note is that these future actions are all planned before speaking about it.
You would notice that the present continuous is formed by adding -ing to the base verb.
Example: eat –> eating
However, sometimes a letter may have to be doubled, or dropped.
sit –> sitting
come –> coming.
Some more examples of doubling:
swim – swimming
run – running
stop – stopping
put – putting
skip – skipping
travel – travelling
regret – regretting
bid – bidding
cut – cutting
dig – digging
cut – cutting
here are some examples of dropping the e before adding ing. Also note the exceptions to the rule:
make – making
write – writing
have – having
shake – shaking
share – sharing
shave – shaving
drive – driving
abide – abiding
arise- arising
awake – awaking
become – becoming
take – taking
lie – lying
die – dying
picnic – picnicking
age – aging
dye – dyeing
singe – singeing
In a sentence, the structure will look like this:
subject + auxiliary be + main verb.
For negative sentences: The NOT goes between the auxiliary verb and the main verb.
For questions sentence: Exchange the subject and the auxiliary verb.
Ex. Are you singing?