ENGLISH VERB DRILLS Ed Swick New York Chicago San Francisco Lisbon London Madrid Mexico City Milan New Delhi San Juan Seoul Singapore Sydney Toronto Copyright © 2009 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. ISBN: 978-0-07-160871-8 MHID: 0-07-160871-0 The material in this eBook also appears in the print version of this title: ISBN: 978-0-07-160870-1, MHID: 0-07-160870-2. All trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners. Rather than put a trademark symbol after every occurrence of a trademarked name, we use names in an editorial fashion only, and to the benefit of the trademark owner, with no intention of infringement of the trademark. 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Contents Preface v 1 Verbs in the Present and Past Tenses 1 2 Auxiliaries of Tense 13 3 Linking and Intransitive Verbs 25 4 Modal Auxiliaries 33 5 Complete and Incomplete Actions 45 6 Questions and Verbs 55 7 Imperatives 65 8 Negation and Contractions 73 9 Modifying Verbs 83 10 Using Participles 91 11 Verbals: Infinitives and Gerunds 99 12 Subject-Verb Agreement 107 13 Tenses, Number, and Clauses 117 14 The Verb Get 125 15 Verbs in Relative Clauses 131 16 Reflexive Verbs and Reciprocal Pronouns 137 iii 17 Passive Voice and Stative Passive 145 18 Passive Voice and Modals 153 19 Subjunctive Mood 159 20 Functions of Phrasal Verbs 169 Mastery Check 177 Appendix: Irregular Verbs 185 Answer Key 188 iv Contents Preface English Verb Drills is designed to help learners develop the skills that pro- mote effective usage of verbs. It is a vehicle for students of all levels to review and drill conjugational forms, tenses, voice, mood, and verb usage. Students of language often struggle with the conjugations of verbs. This is particularly true of European languages. One fortunate exception is the English language. Except for the third-person singular conjugation of most verbs, there are no conjugational endings to be considered in the present tense. In the third-person singular, most verbs simply require the ending -s. Although the conjugation of English verbs is a relatively simple mat- ter, there are other aspects of verbs that require explanation, illustration, and practice. The two most significant of these aspects are verb irregulari- ties and verb usage. This book identifies the varieties of verb irregularities and provides abundant practice with them. The patterns of verb usage are also explained and illustrated and accompanied by numerous exercises for practice. At the end of the book is a Mastery Check for learners to verify the development of their skill with all the aspects of verbs provided in the entire book. Besides an Answer Key, there is a useful appendix at the end of the book that provides a complete list of irregular English verbs. English Verb Drills can serve as an important study aid to all those who wish to perfect their knowledge of English verbs. The book is equally suitable in an English-language classroom or for self-study and is an effective tool for clarifying the complexities and idiosyncrasies of the English verb. v This page intentionally left blank 1 Verbs in the Present and Past Tenses A tense tells in what time the action of a verb takes place: the present, the past, or the future. The Present Tense The base form of a verb is called the infinitive. Infinitives are composed of the particle word to and the verb: to sing, to dance, to develop, and so on. In the conjugation of a verb in the present tense, the particle word to is omitted. The ending -s is added to the verb in the third-person singular. Pronoun to sleep to hurry to belong I sleep hurry belong you sleep hurry belong he / she / it sleeps hurries belongs we sleep hurry belong they sleep hurry belong Verbs that end in -y change to -ie- in the third-person singular conjugation and then add the ending -s. However, if the final -y of a verb is preceded by a vowel (a, e, i, o, u), the -y does not change to -ie-. Pronoun to marry to try to fly to say I marry try fly say you marry try fly say he / she / it marries tries flies says we marry try fly say they marry try fly say For verbs that end in a sound such as -s, -z, -ch, -tch, or -sh, add the ending -es instead of -s in the third-person singular conjugation of the present tense. 1 Pronoun to miss to catch to rush I miss catch rush you miss catch rush he / she / it misses catches rushes we miss catch rush they miss catch rush The ending -es is also used as the third-person singular present tense ending for verbs that end in vowels. For example: I do / he does I go / he goes If a verb already ends in -e, just add -s: I save / he saves I believe / he believes If a noun is used in place of a third-person pronoun, a plural noun will require no ending on the verb, and a singular noun will require the ending -s: the men sing / the man sings boys run / a boy runs This conjugational usage with nouns follows the pattern of the plural and singular third-person plural and singular pronouns: they sing / he, she, it sings they run / he, she, it runs Exercise 1 Fill in the blank with the appropriate present tense form of the infinitive provided in parentheses. For example: John asks his father for some advice. (to ask) 1. I never about things I don’t understand. (to speak) 2. Mary and I often to the radio in the evening. (to listen) 3. She seldom to keep her room tidy. (to forget) 4. My brother about getting into college. (to worry) 5. The little boy when he doesn’t get his way. (to cry) 6. You never my questions directly. (to answer) 2English Verb Drills 7. We Aunt Helen with a beautiful birthday cake. (to surprise) 8. The dog the large bone in the backyard. (to bury) 9. The brothers all their money on video games. (to spend) 10. It usually rather humid in the midafternoon. (to become) 11. They the documents then quickly his office. (to sign / to leave) 12. Bill to borrow my car, but he never me his. (to like / to lend) 13. He the party and for it with his credit card. (to arrange / to pay) 14. I we change the rules and Jim to join our club. (to suggest / to allow) 15. Mark the girl behind the barn and suddenly her. (to catch / to kiss) To Be and To Have Two English verbs need to be considered separately because they have a slightly more complicated conjugation in the present tense. These verbs are to be and to have. The conjugation of these two verbs is significant because, besides being able to function alone in a sentence, they can also serve as auxiliaries of other verbs and in tenses other than the present tense.