Teacher notes — Grammar for Korean Speakers
Korean students drop -ed past tense mid-sentence: why it happens and how to drill it out
- Run the Yesterday/Today chain drill standing up. Sitting slows it down and they start thinking in Korean first.
- Do not accept "Yesterday I go-ed" as correct, even though they caught it mid-word. Make them say the whole sentence clean.
- Irregular verbs (went, ate, bought) cause fewer errors than regular -ed. Drill the regular ones harder.
- If a student consistently drops -ed on one verb (usually play or watch), isolate that verb and make them repeat it five times in a row: "Yesterday I played. Yesterday I played. Yesterday I played..."
- Loop this back monthly. The error reappears under pressure even after they seem to have it.