When do you use was and when do you use were? A sentence in my CLEP study guide says the following sentence is correct but I don't think it is. Here is the sentence:
There was trees planted in the front of the house.
When I said was should be were it told me I was wrong... I'm so confused. Could the test be wrong?
Good grief... the test is definitely wrong.
"There were trees..." is correct.
Tests can definitely have errors in them!!
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You were correct in that situation. I was a lit major, won all the spelling bees, and I'm a writer.
I have to say that I believe the guide is wrong. You would say, "trees were planted" not "trees was planted." I think you are right!
Of course, I could be wrong, too! :o)
this is the only rule I could see them trying to justify that with...but I would think it would have to say A grove was planted...for it to really work.
In case of collective nouns such as family, audience, crowd, flock, etc., always use singular verbs.
for what its worth if you put it in word and have it check grammar it says its wrong--trees were or tree was is what it has for solutions.
was there a reason given with the study guide for why their way would be correct? you got me all sorts of curious if there is an obscure rule I don't know about like figuring out just how that i-before-e except after rule and all the exceptions to it...lol.
Sounds wrong to me! "Trees were planted" or "A tree was planted"
"Was" is used with singular words ("There WAS A TREE planted.....")
"Were" is used with plural words ("There WERE TREES planted.....")
Hope this helps.
Was is singular, were is plural. You are correct! That makes me worried that the test said you were wrong.
The test is wrong...were is definitely correct!
I think it is There were trees. or There was a tree. Were is for plural and was is for singular. They were. He was. etc. You are right as far as I know!
J.,
YOU are the one who is right! The subject of this sentence is "trees"; therefore you need the plural version of the verb, i.e. "were".
I have to diagram the sentence to figure it out sometimes! What was planted? Trees. Trees were.
By the way, tests can always be wrong, they were made by humans!
You are right. Trees is plural, therfore the word used should be were.
There is a book I found that you might be interested in looking at. It is called Wo is I. It talks about many common errors and the right word or phrase,then it explains why. Good luck P.
Hmmm. . . well, not that this is worth much, but I am a proposal writer/technical editor and if I saw that sentence I would most definitely change it to "were." Either there is some very obscure rule that I've never heard of or the test is wrong. I think the test is wrong. Let us know what you find out. . . you've got me curious.
Use 'were' when what you're talking about (the noun) is plural. Use 'was' when the noun is singular. It's that simple and always the rule without exception. There was a tree planted in front of the house. There were trees planted in front of the house.
Your test is wrong! If the sentence was "There was a tree planted in front of the house." then it would be correct. I am sure someone will write and give you more specifics as to why, however I write a lot of copy for a living and "There was trees planted in front of the house." is not correct.
Fight it girl. = )
You are right, but I know why your text got it wrong. It confused the subject of the sentence (house) with the noun being referred to in the past (trees). It was most likely checked by a low level grammar checker. The grammar check in Word, for example, can also make a similar mistake.
Have faith, however, that you are right! Was = singular, were = plural.
was is singular were is plural
You are right. There were trees. There was a tree.
there were trees.
there was a tree.
And Microsoft Word's grammar check agrees with us that it is were. That test must be wrong.
Your study guide is definitely wrong, and if there's a way you could let the publishers know, I imagine they'd be grateful. The editor's eyes must have been somewhere else at that moment.
. YOu was correct, or is that you were correct. JK! You got the answer right.
I think the test is wrong, too, although I have no textbook right at hand to back me up. The subject of it is "trees," even though it's placed in the sentence where it is. The verb always agrees with the subject so, since the subject is plural, the verb should be "were." You could rearrange the sentence so it reads, "Trees were planted in front of the house."
I've heard people *say,* "There was trees planted..." but that's a colloquial style of speaking.
the test could defently be wrong dont sell your self short or feel gulity cause you got one quistion wrong everybody should be that way never ever sellthemselfs short and dont ever rely on testing or medical adivce cause they are not perfect and they could be wrong sometimes to, so don't let it bother you you have two great child and you are very happy in your marriage so no worries be happy
Plural = were
Singular = was
There trees were planted...
The exception is when certain words are singular but have an 's.'
Good luck.
