Tips And Tricks And Shortcuts On Subject-Verb Agreement

August 31, 2023

Tips and Tricks and Shortcuts For Subject Verb Agreement

Just knowing the basics won’t help you need to know the Tips and Tricks and Shortcuts for Subject Verb Agreement too.

Subject-verb agreement is an extremely basic segment of the English language. It means that the subject should agree with the verb in a sentence.

The key here is to check whether the verb agrees with the subject in terms of both number and person. However, these questions sometimes get tricky when it comes to certain thrown-up elements in a sentence.

Tips And Tricks And Shortcuts On Subject-Verb Agreement

Tips and Tricks and Shortcuts For Subject-Verb Agreement

Tip 1- Indefinite Pronouns are considered singular and require a singular verb.
  • List of Indefinite Pronoun.
    • anybody,
    • anyone,
    • no one,
    • nothing,
    • something,
    • whatever,
    • whoever.
  • Example –
    • Everybody wants to party after the class
    • Nothing seems to go right when you are sad and angry
    • Whoever comes to the meeting will be honored
 
Tip 2- Depending on usage Indefinite pronoun may be singular or plural. There is basically 5 indefinite Noun.
  • Indefinite pronoun AANSM ( All, Any, None, Some, Must/More).
  • You can use fingertips AANSM to remember 5 indefinite pronouns.
  • Countable Noun Example
    (i)     Many of the ladies are going out.
    (ii) Most of the students were doing a party at the annual function.

    Here we can see in both cases ladies and students are plural and verbs also are and were.

  • Uncountable Noun Example
    (i)     At the party, some regulation is needed
    (ii) Love is an extraordinary feeling.

    Here in both cases, we can see that limitation and love are uncountable nouns, hence we consider these are a singular form of verbs.

 
Tip 3- Verbs between singular and plural noun

The most common mistake people that people do is confuse the subject and the predicate which leads to a verb confusion. Let’s see a few examples:

(1)

  • Wrong- Sana’s necklace were shiny objects.
  • Correct- Sana’s necklace has shiny objects
    Here, the confusion between necklace and objects is real. However, the subject here is the necklace which will decide the verb.

(2)

  • Wrong – the reporter along with few cameramen are present at the conference
  • Correct – the reporter along with few cameramen is present at the conference
    Here, the confusion may be with the report or the cameramen. While the subject is the reporter, the verb will be singular as well.

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Sample Questions

Question 1.

Fill the correct form of the verb in the blank:

The woman and her husband ____ to the same tribe.

  1. Belong
  2. Belongs
  3. Belonging
  4. are belong

Correct Answer: A
Explanation:

Since the two subjects are joined by ‘and’ the verb will be plural – Belong.

Question 2.

Detect error in the below sentence:

Everyone _____ to stand up when the Principal comes.

  1. Needs
  2. Need
  3. Needing
  4. None of the above

Correct Answer: A
Explanation:

According to the rules, if a sentence has a word like ‘everyone;, ;each; etc, it will be considered singular. Hence, needs.

Question 3.

Replace the underlined word by choosing the correct option:

A large amount of money were deducted from the account.

  1. has
  2. have
  3. was
  4. none

Correct Answer: C
Explanation:

The noun here is uncountable, as we are not sure how much money is deducted. Therefore, “was” should be used instead of “were.”

Question: 4

Detect the error in the below sentence:

The students, as well as their parents, _______ excited about an annual gathering.

  1. Is
  2. Are
  3. Were
  4. Was

Correct Answer: B

Explanation –

The complete and correct sentence will be The students, as well as their parents, are excited about an annual gathering. When a phrase comes between the subject and the verb, remember that the verb still agrees with the subject, not the noun or pronoun in the phrase following the subject of the sentence.

Question: 5

Each of the volleyball players _____ willing to be recorded while they were playing.

  1. Were
  2. Was
  3. Is
  4. are

Correct option: B

Explanation –

The complete sentence will be – Each of the participants was willing to be recorded. Here ‘was’ is used as per the sentence in the past tense.

Read Also: How to solve Subject-verb agreement questions

Also Check Out

Suject Verb Agreement Question and Answers
Subject Verb Agreement Rules
How To Solve Subect Verb Agreement Questions Quickly
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