Negative be. This lesson is about how to form be in the negative in the simple present. Remember the be verb chart. There are three forms; am, is, are. The negative of be is simple. To form the negative, add the word not. I am not, you are not, he is not, she is not, it is not, we are not, you are not, and they are not. If you know the be verb, you know how to form the negative. Here are some examples. Diana is a scientist. She is not a doctor. She is not sad. She is not at home. She is at work. The strawberries are sweet. They are not sour. They are not green. They are not on a plate. They are in a bowl. You can see, just add not when you want the meaning to be negative. There are three ways to write the negative form. Let's look. Cindy is asleep. She is not awake. She's not awake. She isn't awake. These three sentences all mean the same thing. In the first sentence, you can see not, she is not awake. In the second sentence, we put she and is together to make she's. In the third sentence, we put is and not together to make isn't. Do you remember what these are called? Contractions. Let's take a closer look. There are three ways to write the negative form. Actually, that's not true, there's only two ways for I am, for first person. But there are three ways for all of the other forms, let's look. The first way you know, add the word not. I am not. You are not. This is simple. The second way is combine the pronoun and be. You already saw this with the be verb chart. Look at I am not. Remember, drop the a, push it together, don't forget the apostrophe; I'm not. You are not, same thing, drop the a, make one word, don't forget the apostrophe. He is not. This time, it's the s you drop, then use the apostrophe, he's not, and she's not, and it's not. The rest of these are, are, so they follow the same pattern. We're not. You're not. They're not. The third way to form the negative is to use a contraction of be and not. You cannot use this way for I, there's no change for first person singular. But the rest, we can do this third way. Look at you are not. This time, we drop the o, we make one word with the n and the t, and we add the apostrophe; you aren't. With he is not, it's the same. Drop the o, make one word, don't forget the apostrophe; he isn't. She isn't. It isn't. The rest all use the form, are, so they look like aren't. We aren't, you aren't, and they aren't. Here are the three ways to form the negative of be again. This car is dirty. First way, just add the word not. It is not clean. Second way, make a contraction with it and is, so we say, it's not clean. The third way is to make a contraction with is and not, so we say, it isn't clean. Notice, we still have is and not in every sentence. You try. What are the three ways to make it negative? The sentence is, he is a student. But no, he is a teacher. How do we make this negative? The first way is, just add not. Where does not go? He is not a student. The second way is to make a contraction with he and is; he's not a student. The third way is to make a contraction with is and not; he isn't a student. Notice in all three ways we still have is and not. What are the three ways to make it negative? This time, the sentence is, they are in class, but no, look at the picture, they are outside. The subject is they, so this time, it's plural. The first way is, just add not. They are not in class. The second way, make a contraction with they and are. They are not in class. The third way, make a contraction with are and not. They aren't in class. What are the three ways to make the sentence negative? He is early. I don't think so. One, he is not early. Two, he's not early. Three, he isn't early. Okay? One more. What are the three ways to make it negative? The sentence says, I am tired, but this is me and I feel fine. The first way, add not. I am not tired. The second way, I'm not tired, and the third way, nothing. Remember, I, you can't do the third way in the negative. Here's some information about a koala that has all three kinds of negative sentences. Look for them as we read. This is a koala. A koala is not a bear. It's a marsupial. Koalas aren't fast on the ground. They live in trees and eat leaves. They aren't meat-eaters. This koala isn't an adult. It is young. Now you know. Form negative be with not. Add not, like, they are not green. Or make a contraction, they're not green, they aren't green. Remember, they're and aren't have the be verb and the word not.
