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Omar Ahmed Posted 5 years ago
Grammar

Correct or not?

Is this true?

  

Top answer

Hi Yes it is. The conjunction 'while' gives us a clear idea that they are both continuous actions performed once at a specific time, so either the past simple or past continuous is acceptable: they both convey the same thing here Dave

  • Hi Yes it is.
  • The conjunction 'while' gives us a clear idea that they are both continuous actions performed once at a specific time, so either the past simple or past continuous is acceptable: they both convey the same thing here Dave
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3 Answers
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Hi

Yes it is. The conjunction 'while' gives us a clear idea that they are both continuous actions performed once at a specific time, so either the past simple or past continuous is acceptable: they both convey the same thing here

Dave

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Omar AhmedIs this true?

Yes, but I find it surprising how few students know it.

The word 'while' does the heavy lifting of making the simple past tenses act AS IF they were past continuous tenses.

I like to give the following example:

Nero fiddled while Rome burned.

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While is used for describing two actions performed by two different people in the same time frame. Here in these sentences, actions are parallel. So we can use the past continuous to convey both actions.

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