electronicity.space

USS · Paper I

English — grammar

Tenses, voice, reported speech, prepositions, and articles.

6 of the 50 questionsWrite this topic →
What the paper asks

Six questions, and they cluster tightly: tenses, voice, reported speech, subject–verb agreement, articles and prepositions. Almost none of it is obscure — the marks are lost to carelessness under time pressure, not to ignorance.

Subject–verb agreement — where most marks go
  • The verb agrees with the subject, not with the nearest noun. One of my friends is a doctor — the subject is one.
  • Each, every, either, neither, everyone are all singular. Neither of the boys was present.
  • Uncountable nouns that look plural take a singular verb: news, mathematics, physics. The news is shocking.
  • A phrase between the subject and the verb changes nothing. Cross it out mentally and the agreement becomes obvious.
Active to passive — the three steps
  • Move the object to the front. Change the verb to the right form of be plus the past participle. Put the old subject after by.
  • The tense must not change. If it was present perfect, it stays present perfect.
TenseActivePassive
Simple presentShe writes a letterA letter is written by her
Simple pastShe wrote a letterA letter was written by her
Present perfectShe has written a letterA letter has been written by her
FutureShe will write a letterA letter will be written by her
ModalShe can write a letterA letter can be written by her
Reported speech — two shifts, not one
  • Shift the tense back one step, and shift the time and place words too. Forgetting the second is the usual half-mark loss.
  • Pronouns change to match the new speaker: I → he/she.
DirectReported
am / iswas
willwould
cancould
todaythat day
tomorrowthe next day
yesterdaythe previous day
herethere
thisthat
Articles — sound, not spelling
  • a before a consonant sound, an before a vowel sound.
  • a university, a European, a one-rupee coin — all begin with consonant sounds despite the vowel letters.
  • an hour, an honest man, an MLA — silent letters make the sound a vowel.
  • the for something already known, unique, or named: the sun, the Ganga, the book I bought.
Conditionals and question tags
  • First conditional: If + simple present, will + verb. Never if … will.
  • A question tag repeats the auxiliary and flips the polarity: positive statement → negative tag. You are coming, aren't you?
  • Isn't it? is not a universal tag, however common it is in speech.
  • Inversion after hardly, never, seldom, no sooner: Hardly had he reached …
Worked through

Change to passive: 'Somebody has stolen my bag.'

  1. Object 'my bag' comes first.
  2. Present perfect active has stolen → present perfect passive has been stolen.
  3. The agent 'somebody' is vague, so by somebody can be dropped.

Report: She said, 'I will come tomorrow.'

  1. Pronoun: I → she.
  2. Tense: will → would.
  3. Time word: tomorrow → the next day.
Where the marks go

These are the mistakes, not the rules — each one is something a student who knows the topic still does under time pressure.

  1. Writing 'If it will rain'. The if-clause takes the simple present even about the future.
  2. Dropping 'been' from a perfect passive. 'My bag has stolen' says the bag did the stealing.
  3. Letting the noun nearest the verb decide agreement. 'One of my friends are' is the standard version of this error.
  4. Changing the tense while changing the voice. The passive rewrites the structure, never the time.
  5. Using 'an' before university and 'a' before hour. The rule follows sound, and both of those trip it.
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