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Essay Writing Help - Subject and Verb Agreement

Subject and Verb Agreement

Every sentence must contain both a subject and a verb. However, the subject and verb must also 'agree'. In this context, the term 'agree' means that they must match i.e. a singular (one) subject must have a singular verb and a plural (more than one) subject must have a plural verb.

  • This sentence is correct:

The boys were happy to go home.

It is correct because the subject, 'boys', is plural and therefore needs the plural form of the verb, 'were'.

  • This sentence is incorrect:

The boys was happy to go home.

It is incorrect because the plural subject, 'boys', is incorrectly being given the singular form of the verb, 'was'.

An area where mistakes often occur is when the present or past participle of a verb is being used (the participle is an 'ing' word as in 'standing' etc.); the participle needs a 'helper' or 'auxiliary' verb to complete it. The participle in a sentence is often misused.

  • The following sentence contains the correct usage of the auxiliary verb and participle and the subject and verb are in agreement:

David was sitting on a bench.

The verb here contains two parts, 'was', the auxiliary, and 'sitting', the participle. Both of these are being used correctly, agreeing with the singular subject, 'David'.

  • In the incorrect version that follows, the auxiliary verb and participle are being used incorrectly:

David was sat on a bench.

In this incorrect sentence, the singular 'was' is being used correctly, agreeing with the singular subject, David, but the participle, 'sat', is being used incorrectly, as it should be 'sitting'.

Watch out for words that sound as if they should have a plural verb but actually need a singular verb, for example, 'none':

None of us are happy.

This sounds correct but is not, as 'none' is singular. The correct usage is:

None of us is happy.

The same is true when a plural noun is used, for example:

The Government was in agreement.

This sounds incorrect but is actually correct, because although there may be many members comprising it, only one 'government' is being discussed so 'was' is right.

Further Resources: