Which irregular verbs should a 2nd grader know?

The high-frequency set they use daily: go/went, see/saw, eat/ate, run/ran, come/came, get/got, make/made, take/took, sit/sat, write/wrote. Master those ten and most of a 2nd grader's speech and writing is covered.

My child says "goed" and "runned." Should I worry?

No; it's a healthy stage. It shows they've learned the regular -ed rule and are applying it everywhere. The irregular forms come with practice and exposure, which is exactly what repeated fresh worksheets are for.

2nd grade irregular past tense verbs

2nd grade irregular past tense verbs worksheets

Most verbs make their past tense with -ed (jump, jumped), but irregular verbs change instead: go/went, see/saw, eat/ate. Second graders learn the everyday set through practice, choosing the real past form over the tempting -ed guess like "goed."

Free printable PDF worksheet, aligned to Common Core L.2.1.d.

Each print is a different sheet with its own answer key. You don't need to sign up.

The kind of sentences you'll fix

Write the past tense of the verb in parentheses in the blank.

The puppy (run) across the wet grass yesterday afternoon.
Fixed: The puppy ran across the wet grass yesterday afternoon.
Last night, Amara (see) a shooting star from her bedroom window.
Wei and his dad (make) blueberry pancakes last Sunday morning.

Every print pulls a new set of sentences at this level, so a make-up test or a second sibling gets a different mix.

What's on a 2nd grade sheet

2nd grade sheets draw from 60 sentences, 7 to a page. All 60 are on 3rd grade sheets too, along with 35 more. 3rd grade sheets print 8 to a page.

A few of the sentences, as the answer key corrects them:

Grandpa gave each of us a shiny coin last night.
On the walk this morning, Bao heard frogs croaking in the ditch.
A rainbow came out after the rain yesterday.

Fix it. Write the past tense of the verb in parentheses in the blank. 7 sentences to fix per page.
Choose the word. Circle the letter of the correct past tense verb. The word in parentheses is the verb to change. 8 questions per page.

Every version prints on US Letter or A4, with its answer key on the last page.

How to teach this

Overregularizing (goed, eated) is developmentally normal and even a good sign; it means the -ed rule has landed. The fix is exposure, not explanation: lots of short practice with the most frequent verbs. Read the sentence with the wrong form out loud occasionally; hearing "we goed" usually gets a laugh and a correction.

Watch for: Adding -ed to everything (goed, runned) is a smart guess that happens to be wrong for these verbs. It means the child has learned the regular rule; now they need the exceptions. Some past forms need a helper: 'she has written', not 'she has wrote'. Our answer keys use the plain past on these sheets.

Common questions about 2nd grade irregular past tense verbs

Which irregular verbs should a 2nd grader know?: The high-frequency set they use daily: go/went, see/saw, eat/ate, run/ran, come/came, get/got, make/made, take/took, sit/sat, write/wrote. Master those ten and most of a 2nd grader's speech and writing is covered.
My child says "goed" and "runned." Should I worry?: No; it's a healthy stage. It shows they've learned the regular -ed rule and are applying it everywhere. The irregular forms come with practice and exposure, which is exactly what repeated fresh worksheets are for.

Related worksheets

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Aligned to Common Core L.2.1.d. Reviewed by the One more sheet team. Content version 240, updated October 2026.

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