KEEP - Basic Verbs - Learn English Grammar

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Verbs are life.

Verbs are life.

Life is verbs.

Hi everybody, my name is Alisha.

Welcome back to Know Your Verbs.

In this episode, we're going to talk about the verb, “keep.”

Let's get started.

The basic definition of the verb, “keep” is to have in possession.

So, like to own something, or to hold something is to keep.

Here are the conjugations for this verb, present tense, “keep” “keeps.”

Past tense, “kept,” past participle tense, “kept,” progressive tense, “keeping.”

Now, let's talk about some additional meanings of this verb.

The first additional meaning for this lesson is to stop something from going somewhere.

This can mean to stop a person like from leaving, or from going to another place or to stop

an object, from moving or from going somewhere.

Let's look at some examples.

“Is our manager at the office?

Can you keep her there for 10 more minutes?”

Okay, next one.

“Keep that car inside the gates.”

So, don't let it go outside the gates, keep it inside the gates.

Meaning number two, additional meaning number two for the verb “keep,” to cause to remain

in a condition, or to cause to remain in a situation.

Let's look at some examples.

“Sorry to keep you waiting.”

So here, “sorry to keep,” sorry to make you stay in the waiting condition, in the

waiting situation.

“Sorry to keep you waiting.

“The boss has kept us wondering about changes for months.”

That was past participle.

The boss has kept us wondering so we remain in the state of wandering here.

“The boss has kept us wondering for months,” so has caused us to wonder continuously for

a period of months is the meaning of this sentence.

Meaning number three for this lesson is just to stay or to continue something.

So, this is a very broad example.

Let's look at a couple examples.

First, “Keep your head.”

“Keep your head,” sounds really strange, right?

So, to keep your head doesn't mean like hold on to your head but the expression “keep

your head” means control your emotions.

So, here your head doesn't refer to your head as the object necessarily, it refers to your

emotions.

So, controlling your emotions to keep your head means like to continue your kind controlled

emotional state.

So, if someone is getting maybe too excited or they're getting really angry, you can say,

“Keep your head.”

Let's look at another example of them.

“Keep in your lane.”

So, it's like imagine you're driving, a lane is the lines on the road.

Those are the lines on the road that people can drive cars in.

So, “Keep in your lane” means stay in your lane, in other words.

Continue in your lane.

We say “keep” but it doesn't mean “hold.”

It means continue in your lane.

So, if someone else, if maybe, the person you're driving with is trying to move to a

different lane, you can say, “Keep in your lane, just stay there.”

So, it means stay.

Another example might be, “Keep quiet.”

“Keep quiet” means stay quiet or continue being quiet but we just say, “Keep quiet”

to mean continue that state.

Meaning number four of “keep” is to persist in a behavior.

So, to persist means to do something many, many times, to continue doing something many

times.

In this case, a behavior.

A behavior is repeating.

So, let's look at some examples.

“This guy keeps calling me.”

So, a guy in this case keeps calling my phone.

“He keeps calling me.”

So, repeatedly, this person is calling me repeatedly.

“He keeps calling me.”

Another example, “We kept sending messages until they responded.”

We kept sending messages until they responded so, meaning we continuously, we repeatedly

sent messages to someone or maybe to a company until we received a response.

So, when we received a response, we stopped sending messages.

“We kept sending messages until they responded.”

Let's go on to some variations of the verb “keep.”

The first variation is to “keep an eye on someone.”

This expression means to watch, like to watch someone closely often too.

Some examples, “Yes, she's keeping an eye on me.”

“She always keeps an eye on the screen.”

“Our boss keeps an eye on our work.”

Example.

“Keep an eye on him.

He's up to something.”

If someone says, “Keep an eye on him,” or like, “Keep an eye on her,” with that

kind of suspicious intonation, this is kind of a negative expression like that person

is suspicious so watch that person to keep an eye on him.

But, if you say it with an upward intonation kind of happy, like “Whoa, keep an eye on

him.

He's doing exciting things,” that means like you should watch that person and expect

something positive like we have positive expectations for that person so this is an important phrase

to listen to the intonation.

Okay, next example of that though, “I'm keeping my eye on you.”

So, again, this is an expression where intonation is important.

“I'm keeping my eye on you” and “I'm keeping my eye on you,” have very different

meanings.

So, “I'm keeping my eye on you,” with that downward intonation sounds suspicious.

I'm suspicious of you, “I'm keeping my eye on you.”

If, however, we emphasize you with that kind of upward intonation in the sentence, “I'm

keeping my eye on you,” it sounds like I'm expecting good things from you.

I'm going to watch you with positive expectations.

The next variation is to “keep one's eyes open.”

“To keep my eyes open,” “to keep your eyes open,” so to keep your eyes open.

I use this actually a lot in live streams, I think.

I say, “keep your eyes open for that,” or “keep an eye out for that.”

So, actually you can use, “keep your eyes open,” or “keep an eye out.”

That's sort of a weird expression.

So, let's start with “keep your eyes open.”

So, plural eyes, two eyes, “keep your eyes open” usually for a thing.

“Keep your eyes open for new ideas.”

or “I'll be keeping my eyes open for the exciting announcement.”

So, that means I will be watching for an announcement or please watch for new ideas in the first

example sentence.

So, “keep your eyes open” means watch for something.

The expression, to “keep an eye out” for means the same thing but we use the singular.

So, “I keep an eye out for new ideas,” “Keep an eye out for an exciting announcement.”

We can use either the singular or the plural eye or eyes.

So, did you learn a little bit more about the word “keep?”

I hope so.

If you have some other meanings or if you know some other variations, have any questions,

or if you want to try to make an example sentence, please feel free to do so in the comment section.

Of course, if you liked the video, please give us a thumbs up, you can subscribe to

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Thanks very much for watching this episode of Know Your Verbs and we'll see you again

soon.

Bye.