Learn English – Correct use of Sit, Was sitting, was seated in English sentence

sentence-construction

Context:

A pregnant lady got into the bus bus and I did not offer her my seat. After alighting from bus my friend asked me"

Que: Why didn't you offer your seat to that pregnant lady?

a) I did not offer my seat to that pregnant lady because I sat on the last seat in the bus.

b) I did not offer my seat to that pregnent lady because I was sitting on the last seat in the bus.

c) I did not offer my seat to that pregnant lady because I was seated on the last seat in the bus.

Best Answer

I presume that you are talking about what happened when the pregnant lady got onto the bus: you didn't offer her your seat (bad you!). The lady getting onto the bus is a single event, so you use simple past to describe it.

the lady got onto the bus.

If a second event occurs, you would also use simple past:

I sat down at the same time as the lady got onto the bus.

If you were in the middle of doing something when the first event occurred, you would used past continuous:

I was sitting when the lady got onto the bus.

In your example, you were in the middle doing something (sitting) when you decided not to offer your seat to the pregnant lady. Option b) is therefore correct.

According to the Cambridge Dictionary, seated can be used as an adjective meaning sitting, so option c) is also correct.

Option a) is not appropriate because it would be taken in this context to refer to a single event.


Note that you can use simple past to describe a habitual action in the past, if you specify a time period:

When I was at school, I sat next to Claire Johnson.

Or to describe a situation that went on for some specified time:

I sat next to Claire all evening.