English Grammar for the Utterly Confused - Laurie Rozakis 2003
Questions
Chapter 5 Agreement: Matching Sentence Parts
Part 2 Usage and Abusage
True-False Questions
1. A subject must agree with its verb in number. Number means singular or plural.
2. A plural subject names one person, place, thing, or idea.
3. A singular subject names more than one person, place, thing, or idea.
4. In English, the plural of most nouns is formed by adding -s or -es to the singular form.
5. Pronouns do not have singular and plural forms.
6. Verbs also show singular and plural forms.
7. The form of the verb changes only in the third-person singular form.
8. A plural subject must have a singular verb. A singular subject must have a plural verb.
9. Two or more singular subjects joined by or or nor must have a singular verb.
10. Subjects that are singular in meaning but plural in form require a singular verb.
11. Plural subjects that function as a single unit take a plural verb.
12. Titles are always singular.
13. Two or more plural subjects joined by or or nor must have a plural verb.
14. A compound subject joined by and is singular and must have a singular verb.
15. If two or more singular and plural subjects are joined by or or nor, always use a plural verb.
16. A collective noun names a group of people or things.
17. Collective nouns are always plural, no matter how they are used in a sentence.
18. Indefinite pronouns can be singular or plural, depending on how they are used in a sentence.
19. Indefinite pronouns include words such as everyone, someone, all, and more.
20. When you are determining agreement, disregard words or phrases that come between the subject and the verb.
21. A pronoun agrees (or matches) with its antecedent in number and person, but not gender.
22. Use a singular personal pronoun with a singular indefinite pronoun.
23. In general, use a plural pronoun when the antecedents are joined by and. This is not true if the antecedents are singular.
24. Antecedents joined by or, nor, or correlative conjunctions such as either... or, neither ... nor agree with the antecedent closer to the pronoun.
25. Agreement makes sentences sound smooth and logical.
26. The noun car is singular, but cars is plural.
27. The noun tomatoes is singular, but tomato is plural.
28. The noun women is singular, but woman is plural.
29. The pronoun I is singular, but we is plural.
30. The verb stands is singular, but stand is plural.
31. The verb are is singular, but is is plural.
32. The verb was eating is singular, but were eating is plural.
33. The verb were is singular, but was is plural.
34. The verb grows is singular, but grow is plural.
35. The verb phrase have been watching is singular, but has been watching is plural.
Completion Questions
Select the word that best completes each sentence.
1. The pop you get when you crack your knuckles (are, is) actually a bubble of gas bursting.
2. Polar bears (is, are) left-handed.
3. The name of all the continents (ends, end) with the same letter that they start with.
4. No president of the United States (were, was) an only child.
5. Everyone (are, is) entitled to my opinion.
6. Here is some good advice: Don’t sneeze when someone (is, are) cutting your hair.
7. If a man (are, is) wearing a striped suit, it’s against the law to throw a knife at him in Natoma, Kansas.
8. In 1659, Massachusetts (mades, made) Christmas illegal.
9. Unless you have a doctor’s note, it (are, is) illegal to buy ice cream after 6 p.m. in Newark, New Jersey.
10. It is a misdemeanor to show movies that (depicts, depict) acts of felonious crime in Montana.
11. I (drives, drive) way too fast to worry about cholesterol.
12. If Barbie (are, is) so popular, why do you have to (buys, buy) her friends?
13. Many people (quits, quit) looking for work when they find a job.
14. A Rolling Stone (play, plays) the guitar.
15. It’s always darkest just before I (open, opens) my eyes.
16. The squeaking wheel (get, gets) annoying.
17. A journey of a thousand miles (begin, begins) with a blister.
18. Don’t count your chickens—it (take, takes) too long.
19. Donald Duck comics (was, were) banned from Finland because he doesn’t wear pants.
20. Kemo Sabe (mean, means) “soggy shrub” in Navajo.
21. All porcupines (floats, float) in water.
22. The only nation whose name (begins, begin) with an A but doesn’t end in an A is Afghanistan.
23. Emus cannot (walks, walk) backwards.
24. Most Americans’ car horns (beep, beeps) in the key of “F.”
25. No word in the English language (rhymes, rhyme) with month.
Multiple-Choice Questions
Choose the best answer to each question.
1. The American slogan for Salem cigarettes, “Salem-Feeling Free,” ... translated into the Japanese market as “When smoking Salem, you will feel so refreshed that your mind ... to be free and empty.”
(a) Was, seems
(b) Was, seem
(c) Were, seem
(d) Were, seems
2. Frank Perdue’s chicken slogan, “It takes a strong man to make a tender chicken,” ... translated into Spanish as “It ... an aroused man to make a chicken affectionate.”
(a) Were, takes
(b) Were, take
(c) Was, takes
(d) Was, take
3. I had a linguistics professor who said that it’s man’s ability to use language that ... him the dominant species on the planet. That may be. But I think there’s one other thing that ... us from animals. We aren’t afraid of vacuum cleaners. —Jeff Stilson
(a) Make, separate
(b) Make, separates
(c) Makes, separate
(d) Makes, separates
4. According to the national average: Once someone ... an elevator button, 58 seconds will pass before they will ... it again. In New York, it’s 11 seconds.
(a) Push, push
(b) Push, pushes
(c) Pushes, push
(d) Pushes, pushes
5. If police arrest a mime, do they ... him he ... the right to remain silent?
(a) Tell, have
(b) Tell, has
(c) Tells, has
(d) Tells, have
6. I’ve learned that it ... years to build up trust and only seconds to destroy ... .
(a) Takes, them
(b) Takes, it
(c) Take, them
(d) Take, it
7. I’ve learned that either you ... your attitude or it ... you.
(a) Control, controls
(b) Control, control
(c) Controls, control
(d) Controls, controls
8. I’ve learned that our background and circumstances may have influenced who we ..., but we are responsible for who we ... .
(a) Is, become
(b) Is, becomes
(c) Are, becomes
(d) Are, become
9. I’ve learned that credentials on the wall do not ... you a decent human being.
(a) Made
(b) Makes
(c) Make
(d) Making
10. Up to 3,000 species of trees ... been cataloged in one square mile of the Amazon jungle.
(a) Is
(b) Was
(c) Has
(d) Have
Further Exercises
1. Correct all errors in agreement in the following paragraph.
Two people left a 15-mile-long trail of doughnuts after they tooks a donut truck from a parking lot and fled, police said Thursday. The truck were parked at a convenience store with its rear doors open and its engine running while a deliveryman carried doughnuts inside, said a Slidell police spokesman. Two suspects hopped in the truck and sped off to the nearby town of Lacombe, with doughnuts spilling out along the way, he said. They abandoned the truck when they was spotted by police responding to reports of a dangerous driver who were losing his doughnuts. A passenger were captured, but the driver, whose name were not released, ran away.
Their motive for taking the truck filled with donuts were unclear.
“I don’t know if it were a need for transportation or if they just had the munchies,” the police said.
2. Correct all errors in agreement in the following paragraph.
A wife are complaining about her husband spending all his time at the local tavern, so one night he take her along with him.
“What’ll ya have?” he ask.
“Oh, I don’t know. The same as you, I suppose,” she reply.
So the husband order a couple of Jack Daniels and gulp his down in one go.
His wife watch him, then take a sip from her glass and immediately spit it out. “Yuck, it tastes awful, worse than awful!” she splutter. “I don’t know how you can drink this stuff!”
“Well, there you goes,” cry the husband. “And you thinks I’m out enjoying myself every night!”