The past participles in Portuguese are the last grammatical structure to be taught at the A2 level. Participles are structures formed from the infinitive of the verb (regular participles) and are used in different grammatical structures taught during the B1 level. This means that only during the B1 level will Portuguese students fully understand the various uses of this grammatical structure.

We start by discussing regular past participles. The regular past participles of verbs ending in -AR (e.g., falar) are formed by adding the ending -ado. Example: verb: falar, past participle: falado.

The regular past participles of verbs ending in -ER (e.g., comer) and -IR (e.g., partir) are formed by adding the ending –IDO. Example: comer » comido, partir » partido.

But participles raise some additional issues. In fact, some verbs do not have regular participles and only have irregular ones. Is there a rule we can use to know which verbs have regular or irregular participles? The answer is no! We have to practice, consolidate, and slowly the information becomes more familiar.

We also have another group of verbs that have two past participles, one regular participle and one irregular participle. Example: Verb ‘prender.’ Regular participle: prendido, irregular participle: preso.

The next question is: how to know when to use regular past participles and irregular past participles? We use regular past participles with the verb ‘TER‘ = ‘to have’ (compound structures at the B1 level), and we use irregular past participles with the verbs ‘SER/ESTAR‘ = ‘to be’. – passive voice – level B1.