Subject and Verb Agreement

1. Subject and Verb Agreement

2. Why do Subjects and Verbs have to agree? What’s wrong with this? Mr. Jefferson eat his peas. Or The ghostly dogs barks at the moon. Or Anyone who think we are wrong is a jerk!

3. Subjects and Verbs • When we write a sentence we are using subjects and verbs • The subject is the noun or pronoun that the sentence is about • The verb is what the subject does

4. Match the number • When we talk about subject/verb agreement, we are matching the number of things • If the noun or pronoun is singular, the verb must be singular • If the noun or pronoun is plural, the verb must be plural

5. Easy enough? • Let’s try some. Decide whether the subject and verb should be singular or plural Mr. Trasker (writes/write) a letter every day. Lucy’s dogs (eats/eat) premium duck au l’orange. Gerbils (decides/decide) where to sleep by smell.

6. Now to get tricky • Nouns are pretty easy to pick our singular and plural • Pronouns are a bit harder • Which ones of these are singular? each, one, someone, either, no one, everybody, anybody, everyone, neither, every one, anyone, nobody

7. ALL of them! • Check it out: • Gerard buys a new bike. • Everyone buys a new bike. • Everyone buy a new bike.

8. Forever alone • The verbs for singular nouns and these pronouns are ALWAYS singular. • Even with other words in between. The steakshe gave us wasa good quality product. “steak” is the subject, it is singular. “was” is the verb, it must also be singular

9. Try them out on your own Over one-half of the employees commute(s) on dragons. The cow’s hunger for barbeque ribs confound(s) zoologists. A knight on a horse ride(s) into the night.

10. Exceptions… • any, all, some, most, none Depending on what follows these indefinite pronouns, they may be singular or plural.

11. Check it out • All dogs go to heaven. • All rice is grown in water. • Some people eat cardboard. • Some person or another eats my lunch everyday.

12. Story Time! • Write a story with a partner that utilizes improper subject verb agreement • We will switch with another pair and try to catch all of their subject-verb agreement issues. • Can you out-fox the other team?