Expressions of Time

Expressions of Time

Past	Present	Future
yesterday	today	tomorrow
last week	this week	next week
an hour ago	now	in an hour
recently	as we speak	soon
a little while ago	at this moment	in the near future
a long time ago	these days	way off in the future
in the past	nowadays	eventually
this morning	at this time	later this evening

Time expressions usually go at the end

or at the beginning of a sentence:

Yesterday I went to school.

I went to school yesterday.

This week I'm going to New York.

I'm going to New York this week.

Other popular time expressions:

In the morning  When I wake up in the morning, I like to drink coffee.  What do you drink in the morning?
during the day  During the day, they go to school .  What do you do during the day?
at night  The stars and the moon come out at night. Most people sleep at night, but cats usually stay out late.
in the afternoon  In the afternoon, I come home from school and do my homework.

Using time expressions with the correct verb tense will improve your English:

- Last week I went to the movies. (past tense. )

- This week I'm working early in the morning. (present continous tense to describe the entire week)

- Next week I'm going to take a trip to California. (the "going to" future)