Systematic and Explicit Instruction on Using Helping Verbs in Complete Sentences

What are Helping Verbs?

Helping verbs work with action and being verbs to give more information about when or how an action is happening. Some verbs always need action verbs. For example, the action verb “been” needs the helping verb “have.” They have been playing all day. Being verbs act as helping verbs when we combine them with action verbs. For example, in the sentence she is singing, the word is acts as a helping verb. Your students have already been using helping verbs!

Here is a list of helping verbs:

am

is

are

was

were

be

being

been

have

has

had

do

does

did

will

shall

would

should

can

could

may

might

must

Here is a video to help your students understand helping verbs.

Example Sentences

After introducing helping verbs to your students, you will want to show them examples. When looking at example sentences, point out the capitalized first letter, spacing between words, and ending punctuation. Speaking of ending punctuation. I recommend sticking with periods until you can give a lesson on the other types of ending punctuation.

This should be a quick part of the lesson. You can ask students what they notice but quickly point out the important parts of the sentence. In these sentences, you want students to notice how the different helping verbs change the sentences.

Helping Verb Pictures

You can show these five pictures to your students to help them brainstorm helping verb sentences. Give students about thirty seconds to think about each picture. Then, have them share with a partner. Finally, collect three to five ideas per picture to record in a class anchor chart.

Printable Resources

These ideas will get you started teaching your helping verb lessons, but we have printable resources that will make a huge difference. Luckily, my team at For the Love has you covered! You can get all of these resources to make planning and teaching a breeze!

Word List: A list of words for the lesson for when your mind goes blank while brainstorming.

Word Chart: A tool for students to organize words they will use to write sentences. Students record words from brainstorming on their word charts, so when they write sentences, they can focus their attention on the mechanics and syntax of the sentence instead of coming up with new ideas. Word charts are the perfect place to integrate social studies and science lessons into writing.

Example Sentences: A list of example sentences that fit the purpose of the lesson. You can use these to build anchor charts, differentiate instruction or practice for students, or clarify your own understanding of the topic.

Sentence Practice: Students will use the words from their word charts to write complete sentences. The sentence practice pages have more suggestion words as well as reminders about the mechanics of a complete sentence. Students who do not need the support of the handwriting lines can write on a piece of notebook paper, or you can give them the alternate writing paper. It does not have the specific lesson information on it.

You can get the lesson on helping verbs at Teachers Pay Teachers.

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