In passive voice of past continuous tense of affirmative sentence, we use auxiliary verb was /were with being and past participle that is third form of verb.
Passive Voice of Past Continuous Tense- Formation
In this, we use helping verb according to the subject that is-
- if subject of passive voice is first person and singular number that is ‘I’, helping verb ‘was’ is used
- for subject of third person and singular number that is ‘he, she or it’, helping verb ‘was’ is used
- if subject is plural or second person, helping verb ‘were’ is used.
In passive voice of continuous past tense- positive, negative, interrogative and negative interrogative, we use past participle (third form) of verb.
Keep in mind that we should arrange the sentence in the following form-
- Active sentence- subject + was / were + present participle (- ing form ) of the verb + object
- Passive sentence- object of the active sentence + was / were + being + past participle ( third form ) of the verb + by + subject of the active sentence
Example of Active Passive Voice- Transformation
Now we shall see an example of passive voice of past continuous tense-
Active: She was drawing a picture yesterday. (drawing- present participle of draw)
Above sentence is in the form-
- Subject + was + present participle of ‘draw’ + object
Passive: A picture was being drawn by her yesterday. (drawn - past participle of draw)
Passive voice of this sentence is in the form-
- Object in active + was + being + past participle of ‘draw’+ by + subject in active + remaining word.
In above sentence, we can see the changes in the transformation of active to passive voice as:
- Object of active form (picture) became subject.
- Subject ‘she’ became object- 'her'.
- Past tense of ‘to be- was’ and being is added
- Past participle of verb ‘draw’ that is drawn is taken.
More Examples
All of these are affirmative sentences-
Active: They were watching a movie.
- Passive: A movie was being watched by them.
Active: A mason was building a wall.
- Passive: A wall was being built by a mason.
Active: A teacher was delivering a lecture.
- Passive: A lecture was being delivered by a teacher.
Active: The students were obeying orders of their physical trainer.
- Passive: Orders of their physical trainer were being obeyed by the students.
You may also like passive voice of the tenses-
- Simple Present
- Continuous Present
- Perfect present
- Simple Past
- Perfect past
- Simple Future
- Future Perfect
