1. To make the verb ‘to be’ negative in the past, we add ‘not’. For example, ‘She was there’ becomes ‘She wasn’t there’ (or ‘She was not there’).
To make most other verbs such as ‘eat’, ‘want’, ‘play’ and ‘see’ negative in the past, we must add ‘did + not’. For example, ‘He saw the movie’ becomes ‘He didn’t see the movie’ (or ‘He did not see the movie’). Note the change in the main verb. When we make the sentence negative, the main verb changes from ‘saw’ to ‘didn’t see’: in other words, did + not + bare infinitive.
2. Look at this extract from The Janitor (Chapter 9 and find examples of verb phrases that are negative.
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