We use the Present Simple:
- to talk about habits and routines: We often go to the cinema on the weekends.
- to talk about facts and generalisations: Students learn all the time.
- with state verbs (they are not normally used in continuous tenses), and here is the list of the state verbs we mentioned: believe, belong, know, like, prefer, remember, see, seem, want, understand, eg. I know people are generally good.
We use the Present Continuous:
- to talk about actions happening now: I am writing a blog post at the moment.
- to talk about temporary situations: Tom is taking German lessons this year.
- to talk about changes: More and more people are getting poor these days.
Here's a handout for further practice:
present_simple_present_continuous.pdf |
You can also check out this video, both tenses are explained very well.