First Grammar Lessons: Part I, Lesson IX

Lesson IX

We shall take our old sentences, only the subjects shall be plural.

The tables is round.
The walls is high.
The curtains is red.

Your ear tells you in a moment that the is is wrong. You want to change the verb is into are.

This is rather odd, for is and are, being both words of the verb Be, have just the same meaning, only we always use are when speaking of more than one thing, that is, with plural nouns.

The reason is that the verb and the subject agree together so well that if the subject changes into the plural number, the verb does the same.

Notice, you do not want to change the adjective. You say:

The table is round, and
The tables are round.

It is only the verb and the subject that agree—if the subject is plural, the verb must be plural too.

To be learnt.

The verb and the subject must agree.

If the subject is plural the verb changes to be like it.

Exercise IX

1. Make sentences about:

the boy, the girl, my cousin, the cat.

Change the subjects to make them plural, and alter the verbs.

2. Make sentences with is and an adjective about twenty things to be seen from the window.

Make the subjects and verbs of all these sentences plural.

3. Put subjects to:

_____ is clean.
_____ are used.
_____ were here.
_____ is mine.

Say whether these subjects and the verbs are singular or plural.