Let's take a look at these sense verbs we have.

The 1st 1 is see, the next one is here.

Then we have smell and then we have feel so these sense verbs quite often can be used in this way.

You have the verb plus something or something.

Plus on I N g.

And what this means is that this was going on or these were going on while you did these things.

You saw something.

You heard something and you smelled something and you felt something.

Let's take a look at number one, See how it works.

I saw John walking to school, so you have your sense for plus a person Plus an I N g.

John was walking and I saw him doing that.

That's the form that it would take very common construction in English.

Number two.

Can you hear the birds chirping?

Well, in this case, it's a question.

So you have your verb and then you have a thing in this case, it's a person, and not in this case, it's a thing.

Can you hear the birds chirping?

The birds were chirping, so the question was, Can you hear them doing that now?

And number three?

I smell something good cooking in this case you smell.

And then there's something, and then there's what it's doing.

And this is a good example of what you would say.

If you're going to complement the cook at your house, I smell something good cooking.

What could it be?

Compare that to I smell something burning.

In other words, there's something in the oven or on the stove that's burning, and it's not going to taste so good.

Finally, we have Number four, which is a little bit different, and I'm gonna explain that as we go, Jane felt her desk shake.

So we have the person feeling, and then we have something in this case, the desk in this, and then we finally have shake.

This is not an I N.

G, and I'm going to explain the difference between Jane felt her desk shake, and Jane felt her desk shaking.

What are the differences between those two?

Let's take a look at them.

Number four.

Jane Felter, Desk Shake and Jane Felter desk shaky.

Well, simply put, this action is completed.

She felt the whole thing, probably.

And number five.

It's shaking while she feels it.

And so the idea here is that the shaking is continuing.

When she felt it, we don't know about the finish of it.

The completion of the shaky same thing in number six.

I saw John fall off his bike.

I saw John the whole thing.

That happened the whole action.

Waas He fell off his bike.

I saw it from the beginning to the end, but in number seven you wouldn't here the rain the whole time from the beginning to the end because it's probably still raining in the morning when you wake up.

I heard it raining all night implies that it's still raining in the morning.

And finally number eight.

John saw John waiting for the bus.

He didn't see her get on the bus.

He just saw her waiting for it.

So the action of waiting isn't completed.

It isn't finished.

She's still waiting for the bus.

When John turned away or drove by in his car.

Whatever.

So the the idea here is that this one and this one with the based form of the verb are completed actions and the ones with I N G's like this are the ones that are continuing.

Once you've finished your, uh, verb, whatever action you are doing.