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Teachers Activity links ____________________ Grammar advanced intermediate beginning ____________________ Reading abridged stories paraphrasing ____________________ Writing essay skills verb choice end focus ____________________ Listening Speaking Teaching Vowels s- endings note-taking skills ____________________ more to come... ____________________ created and maintained by Douglas E. Adams		Changing Grammar: The Grammar Toolbox- page 2 Of course, writing exclusively in the passive does not make for a very good paraphrase. The passive works best in combination with the tools that change nouns. Easiest among these for intermediate learners is the use of gerunds and infinitives. They can be used to change simple sentences containing modals as well as those that do not. For example,      Scientists must remove the DNA from the cell.. We can change the verb in the sentence above to a gerund/infinitive subject and replace the modal with an adjective or noun possessing the same meaning.      Removing the DNA from the cell is required for scientists.. or...      To remove the DNA from the cell is a requirement for scientists.*. [* It is required for scientists to remove the DNA from the cell.] An added benefit of this approach is that it provides an opportunity for students to learn a set of synonyms for commonly used modals. A limitation to this tool is that not every sentence actually contains a modal. For sentences without a modal, gerunds, and to a lesser extent, infinitives, can also be used in combination with the passive for a wider variety of sentence options.      ex: Congress initiated a free trade policy with Mexico in 1992 in an attempt to open new markets for American products. a free trade policy with Mexico in 1992 tells us what Congress initiated and is therefore the direct object. Likewise, in the sentences...      ex: CDC researchers are developing new techniques to identify and solve important health problems in poor urban communities.      ex: Engineers have created advanced microchips to devise computers with even faster processors. ...as mentioned earlier, new techniques to identify and solve important health problems tell us what CDC researchers are developing, and advanced microchips tell us what engineers have created. We can change the verb in the sentences above to a gerund/infinitive and introduce the passive form of the verb do since initiated is an action. We then simply attach the newly formed gerund/infinitive to the rest of the direct object to make a passive sentence.      ex:Initiating a free trade policy with Mexico in 1992 was done by Congress in an attempt to open new markets for American products .      ex:Developing new techniques to identify and solve important health problems is being done by CDC researchers in poor urban communities .      ex:To create advanced microchips has been done by engineers to devise computers with even faster processors . We can also move the prepositional phrases around to further alter the sentence.      ex:In an attempt to open new markets for American products, initiating a free trade policy with Mexico was done by Congress in 1992 .      ex:In poor urban communities, developing new techniques to identify and solve important health problems is being done by CDC researchers . Let's continue our discussion with Changing Grammar - page 3.

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