Agreement and Tense Flashcards
All 12 cards in this deck
What is subject–verb agreement?
The verb must match its subject in number: a singular subject takes a singular verb, and a plural subject takes a plural verb. The dog barks. / The dogs bark. Examiners name agreement errors as one of the most common AO6 weaknesses.
How do you make the verb agree when words come between the subject and the verb?
Find the main noun, not the nearest one. The box of chocolates was on the table (the box was). A list of the winners is on the wall (the list is).
Do words like everyone, each and nobody take a singular or plural verb?
Singular: Everyone was silent. / Each of the rooms has a window. / Nobody knows.
What verb follows two subjects joined by and?
A plural verb: My brother and I were late. / The rain and the wind have stopped.
How do you make there is and there are agree?
Look at the noun that comes after: There is one reason / There are three reasons. A common slip is there's with a plural (there's lots of reasons). Write there are.
With either…or and neither…nor, which subject does the verb agree with?
The nearer one: Neither the teacher nor the students were ready. / Either the students or the teacher is wrong.
What is tense consistency, and why does it matter in your imaginative writing?
Stay in the tense you started in unless time genuinely changes. Stories that drift between past and present (I walked in and I see…) look out of control, which is a commonly named AO6 weakness.
What effect does writing a story in the present tense have?
It creates immediacy, as if events are unfolding now and the reader is right there. Both tenses are fine; what matters is that you choose one and keep to it.
When do you use the past perfect (had + past participle)?
For an event that happened before another past event: By the time we arrived, the film had started. It is also a neat way to slip into a flashback within a past-tense story.
Correct this: One of the windows were broken.
One of the windows was broken. The subject is one, which is singular; windows is just the noun nearest the verb.
Correct the tense slip: I walked into the room and I see a man sitting in the corner.
I walked into the room and I saw a man sitting in the corner. The sentence starts in the past tense, so it must stay there.
How can you check your writing for agreement errors?
They usually hide in long sentences. For each main verb, find its subject (who or what is doing it) and check that both are singular or both plural. Then check that every paragraph keeps the same tense.