Active & Passive verb Voice | Week 3 | Grade 8

Active vs. Passive Voice
GRAMMAR

Active voice means that a sentence has a subject that acts upon its verb. Passive voice means that a subject is a recipient of a verb’s action. Some writers may say that the passive voice is weak and incorrect, but it isn’t that simple. When used correctly and in moderation, the passive voice is fine.

In English grammar, verbs have five properties: voice, mood, tense, person, and number; here, we are concerned with voice. The two grammatical voices are active and passive.



What exactly is the Active Voice?


When the subject of a sentence performs the verb’s action, we say that the sentence is in the active voice. Sentences in the active voice have a strong, direct, and clear tone. Here are some short and straightforward examples of active voice:

Monkeys love bananas.
The cashier counted the money.
The dog chased the man.

All three sentences have a basic active voice construction: subject, verb, and object. The subject monkey performs the action described by "love". The subject the cashier performs the action described by counted. The subject the dog performs the action described by chased. The subjects are doing, doing, doing—they take action in their sentences. The active voice reminds us of the popular Nike slogan, “Just Do It.”

More Active Voice examples:




What exactly is the Passive Voice:


One of the two “voices” of verbs. A verb is in the passive voice when the subject of the sentence is acted on by the verb. For example, in “The ball was thrown by the pitcher,” the ball (the subject) receives the action of the verb, and was thrown is in the passive voice. The same sentence cast in the active voice would be, “The pitcher threw the ball.”

One can change the normal word order of many active sentences (those with a direct object) so that the subject is no longer active, but is, instead, being acted upon by the verb - or passive.

Note in these examples how the subject-verb relationship has changed.


Because the subject is being "acted upon" (or is passive), such sentences are said to be in the passive voice.




When to use active and passive voice

Using the active voice conveys a strong, clear tone and the passive voice is subtler and weaker. Here’s some good advice: don’t use the passive voice just because you think it sounds a bit fancier than the active voice.

That said, there are times the passive voice is useful and called for. Take “The squirrel was chased by the dog,” for example. That sentence construction would be helpful if the squirrel were the focus of your writing and not the dog.

A good rule of thumb is to try to put the majority of your sentences in the active voice, unless you truly can’t write your sentence in any other way



More Examples of Active V.S. Passive Sentences





Here are pictures of the questions from the worksheet that you should have:




Answers:

Activity #1

1. Active

2. Passive

3. Active

4. Passive

5. Passive

6. Passive

7. Active

8. Passive

9. Passive

10. Active


Activity #2

1. The car hit the dog.

2. The construction crew will build the house in five months.

3. Mary is reading a novel.

4. The kid threw a stone.

5. He bought a car.

6. Someone had knocked at the door.

8. People in my country eat Yam / My country people eat Yam.

9. She teaches him the mother tongue.

10. The cat eats/ate the fish.

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