Grammar Drills and Exercises with Answers

Any student at intermediate level should have got all of these correct, perhaps with one or two slips. Note how the simple present is used with habits, with usual or characteristic or customary events, and the continuous present with what is happening now or what is planned to happen in the very near future. Take off two marks for every "s" missed in the third person singular.

1. What time do you want breakfast in the morning?

2. I normally eat at seven, but when I take an early flight I grab a cup of coffee at six.

3. Are you taking an early flight tomorrow?

4. No. I am visiting our local office in the morning and then catching a lunchtime plane to Paris.

5. Who are you seeing in Paris?

6. I am meeting Gustav Leroux, our French agent. He lives in Paris and runs our French subsidiary.

7. Are you keeping him up to the mark?

8. That is not necessary. He sets a high standard.

9. What do you mean?

10. Our French operation makes a higher return per dollar invested than we do in Detroit.

11. Why are you going over there then?

12. We are thinking of expanding into Spain. Personally, I do not think it is a good idea. What do you think you?

13. I suppose if you have an office in Paris, you want to make the best use of it.

14. It appears that Leroux speaks Spanish fluently. His family belong to the Pyrenees, and his mother is Spanish.

15. What do you believe is the problem then?

16. I worry/am worrying/am worried about next year. If Leroux succeeds in Spain, we are giving him control of the whole European operation.

17. Does that matter?

18. You bet it does. Leroux speaks not just French, Spanish and English. He understands German as well.

19. You mean...?

20. Yes. If Leroux runs everything, what do I do?

VERB FORM AND USE

01 simple present
02 simple present have-be
03 drill: third person
04 elementary present
05 intermediate present

07 elementary past
08 continuous and simple
09 irregular past
10 irregular past
11 irregular past

14 past tense review
15 past tense review

19 present perfect
20 present/past perfect

23 conditional review
24 conditional
25 conditional

28 use of gerund
29 gerund
30 gerund and infinitive
31 gerund and infinitive
32 gerund and infinitive
33 gerund and infinitive