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
