S-V AGREEMENT

Rule 1 2. The captain along with the sailors was drowned.

If two subjects are joined by ‘and‘, the plural verb will be used.
3. My father, unlike my uncles, is very strict.
Rule 4
Example: Ram and Shyam are coming. If an article is placed just before the 1st subject, it means the person/think is the
same for which two nouns are used. Hence singular verb will be used.

Rule 2
Examples:
If two or more than two nouns are adjectives are joined by ‘and’ but only person or
thing or idea is discussed singular verb will be used.
1. A white and black gown was bought by her.

Examples: 2. Churchil was a great orator and a great politician of his time. (wrong)
Churchil was a great orator and politician of his time. (right)
But if an article is used before every subject, it refers
1. My friend, philosopher and guide have come. (change ‘have‘ to ‘has‘) to different people/things.
2. Slow and steady win the race. (change ‘win‘ into ‘wins‘)
3. Fish and chips is my favourite dish. (no error) Hence plural verb will be used.
If two uncountable nouns are joined by ‘and‘ and
if tow different subjects are discussed, plural verb will Example: The director and the producer have come.
be used.

Example: Poverty and misery come together.

Rule 5

If two subjects are joined by ‘neither….nor‘, ‘either … or‘, ‘not only‘, …’but also‘, ‘nor‘,
Rule 3 ‘or‘, ‘none-but‘, the verb will agree with the nearest subject.

If the subject is joined by ‘as well as‘, ‘with‘, ‘alongwith‘, ‘together with‘, ‘and not‘, ‘In Examples:
addition to‘, ‘but‘, ‘besides‘, ‘except‘, ‘rather than‘, ‘accompained by‘, ‘like‘, ‘unlike‘, ‘no
less than‘, ‘nothing but‘, the verb will agree with the first subject.
1. Neither Ram nor Shyam has come.
Examples: 2. Either Ram or his friends have come.
3. Has Ram or Shyam come?
1. Ram, as well as his parents, is coming.
 Names list

Names of The United States, The West Indies

Rule 6
Countries etc.

‘Neither of‘ means ‘not either of the two things or people‘.Neither of the judges of Names of The Arabian Nights, Three Musketeers
the division bench knew about the facts of the case. (Correct) books etc.

Names of Physics, Economics, Civics, Statistics,

 ‘None of‘ means ‘not one of the groups of things or people‘. subjects Politics, Linguistics.
1. Neither of his four sons looked after him. (incorrect)
1. Mathematics is an interesting subject
2. None of his four sons looked after him.
2. Politics is not my cup of tea.
 ‘Either of‘ means ‘one of the two things or people‘.
Examples:
Note: If ‘Statics‘ means ‘data‘, Mathematics‘ means
‘Calculation‘ and ‘Politics‘ means ‘Political thought‘,
plural verb is used.
1. Either of the five members is at fault. (incorrect)
2. One of the five members is at fault. (correct) Example: Statics have revealed multiple scams in the
3. Either of the twins will be made the trustee. (correct) organisation of the Commonwealth Games.
Note: ‘Not’ is not used with ‘both‘. For this purpose
‘neither of‘ is used. Rule 8

Usually, we match the verb with the nearest subject but this is wrong. Match the
1. Both of them did not take the exam. verb with the main subject of the sentence.
2. Neither of them took the exam.
Rule 7 Examples:

Certain nouns are plural in form but singular in meaning. Hence they take singular
verb. 1. The quality of apples is good.
2. He and not his parents is guilty.

Names list 3. The appeal of the victims for the transfer of the cases related to riots to some
other states has been accepted.
Names of Measles, Mumps, Rickets, Shingles
diseases etc.

Names of Billiards, Darts, Draughts etc.

games
Rule 9 Subject-verb Agreement Rules

Collective noun always takes a singular verb.

Examples:
Rule 11

If a subject and the verb are joined by a relative pronoun, the verb used will agree
1. The herd of cows is grazing in the field.
with the antecedent to the relative pronoun.

2. The committee has unanimously taken its decision.

If there is a division among the members of the collective noun or we talk about the Examples:
members of the collective noun, plural verb and plural pronoun are used.

1. She is one of the noblest women that has ever lived on this earth.
1. The jury are divided in their opinion. (That is a relative pronoun so here we use ‘have‘ in place of ‘has‘)

2. The audience have taken their seats. 2. I am not one of those who will trust everyone whom I meet.
(who is a relative pronoun so here we use ‘they meet‘ in place of ‘i meet‘
Rule 10 Note: Try to understand the meaning of the sentence in
this type of questions.
The plural number will always take a plural verb.

Hundred boys are in my class. Rule 12

Each, Every, Everyone, Someone, Somebody, Nobody, None, One, Any, Many a, More
Note: If plural noun is used after cardinal than one, are singular. Hence they will take a singular verb, singular
adjectives (one, two, three, four etc.) and if plural noun noun, and singular pronoun.
denotes certain amount, weight, height or period, singular Examples:
verb will be used.
1. Each student has come.
In other words, we can say that the plural numbers used as a singular unit will take
a singular verb.
2. Each boy each girl has come.
3. One must tolerate one’s friend as well as his enemy. (Use ‘one’s‘ in place of
‘his‘)
Examples:
4. Many a student have not done their homework. (Use ‘his‘ in place of ‘their‘)
5. More than one man was present there.
1. Hundred rupees is in my pocket.
Note: Many is used in the following ways:
2. Ten miles is a long distance to cover on foot.

 Many a man has come.

 Many men have come.
  A great /A good many men have come. 2. If he were rich, he would help others.
Rule 13 Rule 17
If ‘of‘ is used after each, every, one, etc. The noun or pronoun that comes An optative Sentences, singular subject takes plural verb.
immediately after ‘of‘ will be plural in form. However
the verb, pronoun, adjective, etc.
Example: Long live the Queen.

Example: One of the boys/them has done his work.

(‘live‘ = plural verb, ‘queen‘ = singular subject)

Rule 14
Rule 18
If ‘each‘ is used after Plural noun or plural pronoun, plural verb is used.
A number of / ‘a large number of ‘/ ‘a great number of’ is used with plural
countable noun. Hence they will take plural verb.
We each have a duty towards our nation.

Examples: A number of students were present. (correct)

Rule 15

If Indefinite Pronoun ‘One‘ comes as the subject of a sentence, it takes singular verb Note: A number of denotes the number of plural
and singular pronoun ‘one‘, ‘one’s‘, and ‘oneself‘ and not ‘he‘, ‘him‘, ‘his‘ or ‘himself‘. For countable noun. It will take singular verb.
example:

 The number of boys are fifty. (incorrect)

Examples:
 The number of boys is fifty. (correct)
Rule 19
 One should keep his promise. (incorrect)
 One should keep one’s promise. (correct) With uncountable nouns we use ‘Amount of /Quantity of’ followed by a singular
verb.
Rule 16

If a sentence states an imaginary position, it starts with if, as if, as though, suppose, I Examples:
wish, in case, would that etc. In such sentences ‘were‘ is used the verb irrespective of
the number of the subject.
 The amount of money are not sufficient. (correct)

Examples:
 The amount of money is not sufficient. (correct)

1. I wish, I were bird.

 Examples:

Rule 20 1. Where are my pants?

‘All‘ can be used in both countable and uncountable sense. When used as uncountable, 2. Where are the tongs?
it takes singular verb and when used as countable, it takes plural verb. 3. The proceeds were deposited in the bank.
Note: Wages can be used in both singular & plural form.
Examples: See the following sentences

1. All is well that ends well. Rule 23

2. All are well at home.
News, innings, politics, summons, physics, economics, ethics, mathematics, mumps, me
Rule 21 asles, rickets, shingles, billiards, athletics are certain nouns that are plural in form but
singular in meaning. They take singular verb.
(When used in sense of discussion) Fuel and Cost are uncountable nouns and hence will
take singular verb. These nouns will not take article. ‘A/An‘, ‘many‘, ‘few‘, ‘number of‘,
Examples:
and ‘plural form‘.

Examples: 1. No news is good news.

2. Politics is a dirty game.

1. The scenery of Kashmir has enchanted us. 3. Economics is an interesting subject.

2. I passed the exam but the percentage of marks was not good. 4. Ethics demands honesty.

3. The mischief committed by him is unpardonable. Rule 24

4. His hair is black..
Examples: Cattle, cavalry, infantry, poultry, peasantry, children, gentry, polic
e, and people are certain nouns are singular in form but plural in
1. He gave me a piece of information.
meaning. They take plural verb ‘s‘ is never used with these nouns.
2. All pieces of information given by her were reliable.
Monies have been collected and handed to the women’s welfare society. Examples:

Rule 22 1. Cattle are grazing in the field.

Certain nouns exist in plural forms only. Thus ‘s’ cannot be removed from such nouns
2. Our infantry have marched forward.
to make then singular. They take the plural verbs with them.
 3. Police have arrested the thieves.
PUNCTUATION MARKS
-Is the use of symbols such as full stops or periods, commas, or question
marks to divide written words into sentences and clauses
1. A question mark (?) is a punctuation symbol placed at the end of a
sentence or phrase to indicate a direct question, as in: She asked, "Are
you happy to be home?" The question mark is also called an interrogation
point, note of interrogation, or question point.
2. The exclamation mark (!), known informally as a bang or a shriek, is used
at the end of a sentence or a short phrase which expresses very strong
feeling. Here are some examples: What a lovely view you have here! That's
fantastic! Johnny, don't touch that!
3. comma is a punctuation mark that represents a short pause and is used to
divide parts of a sentence. A comma usually resembles a dot with a tail (,)
and is placed at the bottom of a line of text or writing.
4. A colon can be used to connect two independent sentences. Typically,
a colon is used when the second sentence clarifies or explains the first
sentence. For example, Me and my sisters are really excited: We're going to
Disneyland!
5. A semicolon (;) is a punctuation mark that has two main
functions: Semicolons separate items in a complex list. For example, The
Council is comprised of ten members: three from Sydney, Australia; four
from Auckland, New Zealand; two from Suva, Fiji; and one from Honiara,
Solomon Islands.
6. Dashes are used to separate groups of words, not to separate parts of
words like a hyphen does. (Learn more about the difference between a
dash and a hyphen here). There are three forms of dashes: em, en, and the
double hyphen. The most common types of dashes are the en dash (–) and
the em dash (—).
7. The hyphen ‐ is a punctuation mark used to join words and to
separate syllables of a single word. The use of hyphens is called
hyphenation. Son-in-law is an example of a hyphenated word.
8. Brackets are typically used to explain or clarify the original text by an
editor. Example: She [Martha] is a great friend of us. In this example
"Martha" was not part of the original sentence, and the editor added it for
clarification.
9. The braces is represented by two pointed and curved parenthesis one after
the other and appears as { }. Braces: Braces are used in English language
punctuation to mark pauses and represent choices. Braces are
extensively used in mathematics to denote numerical sets of numbers.
10. Use parentheses to enclose information that clarifies or is used as an
aside. Example: He finally answered (after taking five minutes to think) that
he did not understand the question. If material in parentheses ends a
sentence, the period goes after the parentheses. Example: He gave me a nice
bonus ($500).
11. An apostrophe is a punctuation mark used in contractions to replace
missing letters. The contraction "we'll" stands for "we will," with the
apostrophe replacing "will" It can also show possession, as in "Mary's car."
The apostrophe indicates the car belongs to Mary
12. Quotation mark in American English noun. one of the marks used to
indicate the beginning and end of a quotation, in English usually shown
as “ at the beginning and ” at the end, or, for a quotation within a quotation,
of single marks of this kind, as “He said, 'I will go.' ”
13. ellipsis means leaving out words rather than repeating them
unnecessarily; for example, saying 'I want to go but I can't' instead of 'I
want to go but I can't go'.
14. The period(.) is also known as a full stop because it signals a speaker or
reader that the sentence has come to an end. Examples: The dog is
brown. My sister's name is Lisa.
CONTEXT CLUE  The sun, stars, and the moon are celestial bodies..
-is used as a way of referring to the bits of information within a text that can serve as hints to
4. Antonym - Authors sometimes provide the reader with words that have the
help a reader understand the meaning of an unfamiliar or unusual word or passage
.
opposite meaning of the unknown word.
1. Inferenc e- When a reader comes to a word they do not know, they can make an
5. Example:
inference (educated guess). This means, the reader uses prior knowledge and
experience and weaves it in with clues the author is providing.
 The industrious server made a lot of money off of tips from his customers while
Example: My dad drinks a cup of joe every morning to help him wake up. He adds a the lazy servers went home with just a few dollars.
little cream and half a teaspoon of sugar.
You can see in the example above that the author uses the word lazy as a contrast to
the word industrious. This helps the reader understand the meaning of the word
In order to infer that a cup of joe is coffee, a reader would need to know at least one industrious.
of a few things.

2. Definition-This context clue is pretty straightforward. The author

either knows that many readers will not know the meaning or the author
wants to make sure the reader knows the meaning of the word because it
5. Synonym - This context clue provides the reader with words that have the
is important to the text. Authors mostly use this technique in nonfiction
same meaning of the unknown word. The synonym of the word can be shown in a
texts couple of ways.
3. Example:

Example:
 The paleontologist, a scientist who studies the remains of living organisms,
spent a month at the site.
 The paleontologist – a scientist who studies the remains of living organisms –  The new girl was aloof, or unsociable.
spent a month at the site.
This form of incorporating a synonym keeps the writing concise.
Another way the author can provide the definition is by using an entire sentence that is
dedicated to telling the meaning of the word.
Words Sentence Synonyms
3. Example - This context clue takes a little bit of detective work. (At least,
that is what I tell my readers.) The author provides an example (or examples) to Rich We all dream of becoming rich. Wealthy
help the reader determine the meaning of the word.
Naughty He is a naughty boy. Mischievous
Example:
Business She runs a big business. Trade
Neat The movie last night was really neat. Tidy

-Antonyms are words with opposite meanings

Here some examples

 Add - Subtract.
 Above - Below.
 After - Before.
 Awake - Asleep.
 Bad - Good.
 Better - Worse.
 Big - Little.
 Birth - Death.

Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pickled

Peppers lyrics
Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked;
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
Where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?
TYPE OF READING
 SKIMMING - is a strategic, selective reading method in which
you focus on the main ideas of a text. When skimming, deliberately
skip text that provides details, stories, data, or other elaboration.
Instead of closely reading every word, focus on the introduction,
chapter summaries, first and last sentences of paragraphs.

 SCANNING - a text is a reading technique where the reader

looks for specific information rather than trying to absorb all the
information.
 CRITICAL READING-is the process of reading texts with the
purpose to understand them fully. It involves asking questions
about the author’s intention, the text’s structure and purpose, and
the meanings of individual words and phrases.
 READING COMPREHENSIVE - is the ability to
actively read the information (mostly passages) provided and
assimilate the information to answer a given set of questions