English Grammar: 2,375 MCQs with Answers

The correct answer is 'an'. The choice between 'a' and 'an' depends on the sound with which the following word begins, not on its spelling. The abbreviation 'N. R. I.' is read letter by letter as 'en-aar-eye', and the first letter N is pronounced with the vowel sound /e/. Since it begins with a vowel sound, the article 'an' is used, as in an M.P., an S.P., an F.I.R. and an hour. 'The' would wrongly make it definite, and omitting the article is not possible before a singular countable noun.

In the sentence 'She sang a sweet song', the word 'sweet' is an adjective because it comes immediately before the noun 'song' and describes its quality, telling us what kind of song it was. It is used attributively here. If the sentence had been 'She sang sweetly', then 'sweetly' would be an adverb modifying the verb 'sang'. A noun names a person, place or thing and a pronoun replaces a noun, neither of which applies to 'sweet' in this sentence. Hence option (2), Adjective, is correct.

The one word for 'a child whose parents are dead' is 'orphan'. Such single words used in place of a whole phrase are known as one word substitutions and are commonly asked in competitive examinations. The other options have quite different meanings — a 'sibling' is a brother or a sister; a 'bigot' is a person who is intolerant towards the opinions or beliefs of others; and a 'bastard' is a child born to parents who are not married to each other. The place where orphans live is called an orphanage.

The grammatically correct sentence is 'John has been living in Egypt since 1942.' Two rules are involved here. First, 'since' is used with a point of time such as 1942, Monday or morning, while 'for' is used with a period of time such as five years or two hours. Second, an action that began in the past and still continues is expressed by the present perfect continuous tense, formed as has/have been + verb-ing. As 'John' is a singular subject, 'has' is used and not 'have'. Hence option (3) is correct.

Every animal has its own characteristic sound, and these verbs are frequently asked in vocabulary questions. An ass or donkey brays, so (a) matches with (iii). A duck quacks, so (b) matches with (i). A fly buzzes, so (c) matches with (iv). A bee hums, so (d) matches with (ii). This gives the combination a-iii, b-i, c-iv, d-ii, which is option (3). Other useful examples are — lions roar, dogs bark, cats mew, horses neigh, cows low, sheep bleat, frogs croak and owls hoot.

The conjunction ‘as if’ introduces an unreal or hypothetical comparison, and English marks such unreality by shifting the verb one tense back. Since the main clause ‘He walks’ is in the present tense, the clause after ‘as if’ must take the past form, giving ‘as if he had a wooden leg’. The sentence does not claim that he actually has a wooden leg; it only says his walk resembles that of a person who does. This is the same subjunctive-like backshift found in ‘He talks as if he knew everything’.

The phrasal verb ‘break in’ means to enter a building forcibly, usually in order to steal, which is exactly what the sentence describes. The other options carry quite different senses: ‘break out’ means to escape or, of a war or disease, to begin suddenly; ‘break down’ means to stop functioning, or to lose emotional control, or to analyse something into parts; and ‘break off’ means to end a relationship or discontinue something abruptly. Phrasal verbs of this kind are idiomatic, so the particle cannot be predicted from the meaning of the base verb.

Latin nouns ending in ‑us usually form their English plural by changing that ending to ‑i, which gives radius–radii, nucleus–nuclei and terminus–termini. ‘Genius’ is the exception in the list because it has two plurals with different meanings. When it denotes a person of extraordinary intellect the plural is ‘geniuses’, whereas ‘genii’ is the plural of the sense ‘guardian spirit’ or ‘jinn’, as in the genie of the lamp. Pairing ‘genius’ with ‘genii’ as its ordinary plural is therefore the incorrect option.

‘Any’ is the determiner normally used in negative statements, in questions and in conditional clauses, and the sentence ‘Ring me up if you need any help’ is a conditional clause introduced by ‘if’. ‘Little’ would carry a negative shade of meaning and would suggest that hardly any help is available, which does not suit an offer. ‘At least’ is an adverbial phrase and not a determiner at all, so it cannot occupy that slot. ‘Enough’ would require a quantity already understood and would change the sense of the offer entirely.

The subjunctive is the verb form used for wishes, demands, recommendations and statements of necessity, and in the present subjunctive the base form of the verb is used regardless of the subject. In ‘It is essential that he take great care’, the expected indicative form would be ‘takes’, and the bare form ‘take’ after the expression of necessity is the mark of the subjunctive. ‘Take great care!’ is imperative, ‘I advise you to take great care’ uses an infinitive after a verb of advising, and ‘You must take great care’ is an ordinary indicative with a modal.