Overview of Subject-Verb Agreement
Among the many things writers need to watch carefully is for the subject (the actor) to agree with the verb (the action). In English, this is usually broken down into two categories, the singular subject with a singular verb, and the plural subject with a plural verb. The first step is to decide what the subject is and what the verb is in the sentence. (That’s why not to turn in a first draft. Writers are usually so busy getting their ideas down on paper that it may take a second look to figure out those details in individual sentences.)
Let’s Look at an Example
The subject in the sentence is the person, place, or thing doing the action. For example, in the sentence, “The boy hits the ball” ,the boy is doing the action. If you replace “the boy” with a proper name, such as “Edgar hits the ball”, Edgar is the one slugging that ball out of the park. The verb is what is happening in the sentence, in this case, a singular verb, hits. If Julio joins the game, the verb will change spelling. “Edgar and Julio hit the ball.”
Delving into Singular Verbs
Singular verbs in the present usually add an s to the end, and plural verbs lose the s. The trick is to discover who or what the subject is first. In most cases, it becomes a little more complicated when the subject of the sentence is hiding in phrases and adjectives. If tall brown-eyed Edgar, who is wearing a green hat, and green-eyed Julio, who is wearing a blue hat with purple stripes, play catch and hit the ball, it is really difficult to tell whether or not the subject and verb agree.
To make matters worse (as in the sentence about Edgar and Julio), both subjects and verbs can be compound. We have Edgar and Julio (a compound subject), and play and hit (a compound verb). In this case, both the plural subject and both parts of the compound plural verb have to agree. (That is, unless one of them gets disgusted and walks away to another part of the park. Thus, Julio hits the ball against the wall, and the s at the end of the verb magically appears.
Rule of Thumb to Remember
A good rule to remember if you get stuck as a writer in the thicket of subjects and verbs is to stop and read the sentence out loud. Sometimes it is easier to hear whether or not the words make sense. We listen to language before we ever learn to write. Edgar agrees with Julio as they both hit the ball.
