A sentence is passive when the thing that is receiving the action is the subject. Active and passive work the same in English as they do is Spanish. To make a sentence passive, put the verb in the past participle, even when using the future passive. To conjugate it in different tenses, simply put the to be verb in the correct tense in front of the verb.

        Examples

Past passive- This car was made in Japan.

Present passive- These cars are made in Japan.

Future passive- These cars will be made in Japan.

        Practice

        Put these sentences in the appropriate passive tense.

1) This car __________________( to make) in Sweden.

2) The packages _________________________ (to ship, mail, send) out next Friday.

3) These toys _________________________ (to make) in China.

4) When are you going to _____________________ (to make) supervisor?

5) This book has been used well. It __________ (to read) many times.

         * When making passive sentences, because the thing receiving the action is the subject, the thing that is doing the action is of lesser importance, so it is not always necessary to include it in the sentence. For example, instead of saying, "my refrigerator is cleaned every three months by me," you could just say, "my refrigerator is cleaned every three months".   

      * Usually, when we are talking about something that is passive, we avoid using the Passive form because it takes too many words, so we use the words, you and they as substitutes to make it active:

        Practice: Put these sentences in the appropriate passive tense.

1) I painted my house last year. _______________________________________.

2) I need to buy new tires for my car every three months _______________________________________.
(This is an example of how the passive tense is more complicated than the active)

3) You make orange juice with oranges, water, and a little sugar.

_____________________________________________.

4) Paola will sing this song tomorrow.

_____________________________________________.

5) Indians used to hunt buffalo.

_____________________________________________.