Revision of Grammmar rules | Grade 9

 There is/are  &  There was/were

Rules: 

1. "There is" is used with singular nouns (e.g: bread, Sun, James). "There are" is use with plural nouns (e.g: pans, dancers, Stars).

2. "There was" (singular form) & "There were" (plural form), are used as the past tense forms of "is" and "are".

When a sentence starts with or includes the word "There", the auxhilary verb that follows it (i.e: is, are, was, were) must agree with the main noun in the sentence. See two examples below - 

A) There was no bread left in the house.

B) There are two packs of biscuits in the cupboard

"House" and "Cupboard" are nouns too, but they are not the main nouns; the verbs in each sentence does not connect to those nouns since they are too far away from it.

Here are some more examples:

There is a cake in the oven.

There are many mangoes on the tree.

There was one customer in the store.

Practice:
Select the correct form of the verb in each bracket.

1. There (is/are) serious problems in this country.

2. I think there (is/are) enough food for this group.

3. When we arrived there (was/were) no one here.

4. There (is/are) a blue pen lying on my desk.

5. There (was/were) rotten onions in the basket.

6. I know there (was/were) some noise in the kitchen last night.

Speical Problems:

Choose the correct word from the brackets.

a) Are you really (intreresting,interested) in my work?

b) I want to listen to an (interested,interesting) conversation.

c) We are not (interested,interesting) in cooking, but we love to eat.

d) Please do not (loose,lose) these books

e) If you (loose,lose) your way, please call me.

f) The door lock is (loose,lose) so be careful when you close it.

g) Look right there! That (loose,lose) screw must have been the problem.

Answers: 1 - are, 2 - is, 3 - was, 4 - is, 5 - were, 6 - was

Answers: a - interested, b - interesting, c - interested, d - lose, e - lose, f - loose, g - loose