Download ACT Verbs – Practice Set 1

ACT English Test ­ Practice Set #1 on Verbs A. Conjugate the verbs / verb phrases according to the change in subject: 1) One of the students goes a. Two of the students ______ b. Some of the students _______ c. None of the students _______ 2) Sally, unlike the other students, is flying twice this year. a.
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She, unlike the other students, ___ ______ twice this year. Sally and Jim, unlike the other students, ____ ______ twice this year. We, unlike the other students, ____ _______ twice this year. Sally and I, unlike the other students, ____ ______ twice this year. 3) Running through the woods, the twins have lost their way back to the path. a.
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Running through the woods, Bill and I ____ ______ our way back to the path. Running through the woods, the group ____ ______ its way back to the path. Running through the woods, the team ____ ______ its way back to the path. Running through the woods, the police ____ ______ their way back to the path. B. Conjugate the verbs / verb phrases according to the change in tense: 1) The thief, in his haste, steals useless trinkets. (simple present) a. The thief, in his haste, ______ useless trinkets. (simple past) b. The thief, in his haste, ______ useless trinkets. (past perfect ­ with past participle) c. The thief, in his haste, ______ useless trinkets. (past continuous ­ with gerund) 2) The sun would hide behind the clouds for days. (with a modal verb) a. The sun _________ behind the clouds for days. (simple present) b. The sun _________ behind the clouds for days. (past perfect ­ with past participle) c. The sun _________ behind the clouds for days. (past continuous ­ with gerund) 3) They sang all of the notes perfectly. (simple past) a. They __________ all of the notes perfectly. (future) b. They __________ all of the notes perfectly. (past perfect ­ with past participle) c. They __________ all of the notes perfectly. (past continuous ­ with gerund) C. List the number (singular/plural) and tense of each verb/verb phrase in bold below: 1) In the sun, the car shined as if it were new. 2) Susan, the swimmer we all wanted to beat, had swum two laps before any of the rest of us finished even one lap. 3) Since I was running (A) late to the meeting, I took (B) a cab instead of the bus. 4) One of the boys, despite the concerns of his mother, is still thinking of moving to Timbuktu. 5) We will go (A) to the concert even if you do not complete (A) all of your homework beforehand. EXPLANATIONS: A. Verbs can either be singular or plural, depending on the subject. In general, singular verbs have an ‘s’, and plural verbs do not. 1) ‘goes’ is in the simple present tense, and can be written either as ‘go’ or ‘goes’ a. Two of the students go b. Some of the students go c. None of the students go OR goes (‘none’ is a unique pronoun that can either be considered singular or plural, though it is likely better to use the plural verb in this case since it lists students in the plural) 2) ‘is flying’ is the singular form of the present continuous tense, taking the form ‘to be’ + gerund. The gerund will not change, but the auxiliary verb ‘to be’ can be written as ‘am’, ‘is’, or ‘are, depending on the subject. a. She, unlike the other students, is flying twice this year. b. Sally and Jim, unlike the other students, are flying twice this year. c. We, unlike the other students, are flying twice this year. d. Sally and I, unlike the other students, are flying twice this year. 3) ‘have lost’ is the plural form of the present perfect, written as ‘to have’ + past participle. The past participle remains the same when the subject changes, but the auxiliary verb ‘to have’ will either be ‘has’ (singular) or ‘have’ (plural) depending on the subject. In this exercise, it is notable that several nouns (group, team, committee, etc) are singular despite referring to a unit that contains more than one person or thing. Since the noun is singular (it has no ‘s’), the verb is singular! The only exception is ‘police’, which is always plural. a. Running through the woods, Bill and I have lost our way back to the path. b. Running through the woods, the group had lost its way back to the path. c. Running through the woods, the team had lost its way back to the path. d. Running through the woods, the police have lost their way back to the path. C. Conjugate the verbs / verb phrases according to the change in tense: 2) The thief, in his haste, steals useless trinkets. (simple present) The simple past is always one word and never uses a helping verb. a. The thief, in his haste, stole useless trinkets. (simple past) The past perfect pairs the past tense of the verb “to have” with the past participle, which is generally a word distinct from the simple past. (In this case, ‘stole’ is very different from ‘stolen’.) b. The thief, in his haste, had stolen useless trinkets. (past perfect ­ with past participle) The past continuous pairs the past tense of the verb “to be” with the gerund, which is always a word ending in ­ing. Gerunds can only be paired with forms of “to be” to form a verb phrase! c. The thief, in his haste, was stealing useless trinkets. (past continuous ­ with gerund) 3) The sun would hide behind the clouds for days. (with a modal verb) a. The sun hides behind the clouds for days. (simple present) b. The sun had hidden behind the clouds for days. (past perfect ­ with past participle) c. The sun was hiding behind the clouds for days. (past continuous ­ with gerund) 4) They sang all of the notes perfectly. (simple past) a. They will sing all of the notes perfectly. (future) b. They had sung all of the notes perfectly. (past perfect ­ with past participle) c. They were singing all of the notes perfectly. (past continuous ­ with gerund) D. List the number (singular/plural) and tense of each verb/verb phrase in bold below: 1) In the sun, the car shined as if it were new. Number: singular, because ‘car’ is singular Tense: simple past tense 2) Susan, the swimmer we all wanted to beat, had swum two laps before any of the rest of us finished even one lap. Number: singular, because ‘Susan’ is singular Tense: past perfect; past tense of ‘to have’ + past participle of ‘swim’ 3) Since I was running (A) late to the meeting, I took (B) a cab instead of the bus. A. Number: first person singular, because ‘I’ refers to one person Tense: past continuous; past tense of ‘to be’ + gerund of ‘run’ B. Number: first person singular Tense: simple past 4) One of the boys, despite the concerns of his mother, is still thinking of moving to Timbuktu. Number: singular, because the subject of the sentence is ‘one’ ­ NOT ‘boys’, which is in a prepositional phrase and cannot be the subject Tense: present continuous; present tense of “to be” + gerund of ‘think’ 5) We will go (A) to the concert even if you do not complete (B) all of your homework beforehand. A. Number: first person plural, because ‘we’ refers to more than one person Tense: future tense; the construction is ‘will’ + the infinitive of ‘go’ B. Number: second person singular OR second person plural. ‘you’ can refer to either. Tense: present tense, negative