ELTIS Grammar and Sentence Structure 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Choose the correct sentence: 'The students _____ their homework before the bell rang.'
- had finished (Correct answer)
- has finished
- have finish
- finishing
Correct answer: had finished
'Had finished' is the past perfect tense, used to describe an action completed before another past action (the bell ringing).
The past perfect tense (had + past participle) is used when two actions occurred in the past and one was completed before the other. Here, finishing homework happened before the bell rang. The structure is: subject + had + past participle. This tense is commonly tested on the ELTIS.
Question 2: Which word correctly completes the sentence? 'Neither the teacher _____ the students were prepared for the fire drill.'
- nor (Correct answer)
- or
- and
- but
Correct answer: nor
'Neither...nor' is a correlative conjunction pair. When 'neither' begins a clause, it must be paired with 'nor.'
Correlative conjunctions always come in pairs: neither/nor, either/or, both/and, not only/but also. 'Neither...nor' is used to indicate that two things are both not true. In this sentence, it means the teacher was not prepared AND the students were not prepared.
Question 3: Identify the correct sentence:
- She asked whether the library was open on weekends. (Correct answer)
- She asked whether was the library open on weekends.
- She asked whether the library open was on weekends.
- She asked whether open was the library on weekends.
Correct answer: She asked whether the library was open on weekends.
In reported (indirect) questions, the word order follows statement order (subject + verb), not question order. 'Whether the library was open' is correct.
When a question is reported indirectly (embedded in another sentence), it uses statement word order rather than inverted question word order. Direct: 'Is the library open?' becomes Indirect: 'She asked whether the library was open.' The subject 'the library' comes before the verb 'was.'
Question 4: Choose the correct form: 'Each of the students _____ required to take the exam.'
- is (Correct answer)
- are
- were
- have been
Correct answer: is
'Each' is a singular indefinite pronoun, so it takes a singular verb 'is.' Even though 'students' is plural, the subject is 'each.'
'Each' is always singular in English, regardless of the noun that follows in a prepositional phrase. 'Each of the students' = each individual student. Therefore, the singular verb 'is' is required. Other words that follow this rule include 'every,' 'everyone,' 'everybody,' and 'everything.'
Question 5: Which sentence uses the conditional correctly?
- If I had studied harder, I would have passed the test. (Correct answer)
- If I would study harder, I would have passed the test.
- If I had studied harder, I will pass the test.
- If I study harder, I would have passed the test.
Correct answer: If I had studied harder, I would have passed the test.
The third conditional (past unreal) uses 'if + had + past participle' in the condition clause and 'would have + past participle' in the result clause.
The third conditional describes hypothetical (unreal) past situations. The structure is: If + past perfect (had + past participle), would have + past participle. 'If I had studied harder, I would have passed' means the speaker did NOT study hard and did NOT pass—it expresses regret about the past.
Question 6: Select the sentence with correct parallel structure:
- The teacher asked students to read the chapter, answer the questions, and write a summary. (Correct answer)
- The teacher asked students to read the chapter, answering the questions, and a summary.
- The teacher asked students reading the chapter, to answer questions, and writing a summary.
- The teacher asked students to read the chapter, answer the questions, and summarizing.
Correct answer: The teacher asked students to read the chapter, answer the questions, and write a summary.
Parallel structure requires that items in a list have the same grammatical form. Here, all three items use the infinitive form: 'to read...answer...write.'
Parallel structure (parallelism) means using the same grammatical pattern for items in a series. Since the first item uses the infinitive 'to read,' the remaining items should also be infinitives: 'answer' and 'write' (the 'to' carries over from the first item). Mixing forms like infinitives, gerunds, and nouns breaks parallelism.
ELTIS Grammar and Sentence Structure 2
Choose the correct sentence: 'The students _____ their homework before the bell rang.'