Are Began or Have Begun?

In modern English “began” is the simple past tense of “begin” “he began to study for the test at midnight.” But the past participle form—preceded by a helping verb—is “begun.” “By morning, he had begun to forget everything he'd studied that night.”

Is have began correct?

“Begun” is a past participle, which means it is used in the present perfect tense. An important factor here is that, like all past participles, “begun” is always used with a helper verb (e.g., “has,” “had” or “have”). Generally, if a sentence has some variation of “have” in it, the correct term to use will be “begun.”

How do you use the word began in a sentence?

[M] [T] It began to rain before I got home. [M] [T] All of a sudden, she began to laugh. [M] [T] After he finished supper, he began to read the novel. [M] [T] I had hardly left home when it began to rain heavily.