Active and passive sentences shift focus. Learn how verbs change form, when the doer matters, and how sentences with two objects can make two correct passives.
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You can find more about this topic by visiting BBC Bitesize - What is a verb?
"You use", "Gran uses" and "flour and eggs make" all use the active voice - we therefore call them active sentences
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Who is using degrees to measure the temperatures? Some passive constructions are ambivalent about who is carrying out the action
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Using the passive voice is an impersonal, more formal way of writing
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Here the passive voice makes this informative sentence more formal in tone
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Use passive voice carefully. Why would it be important to focus on the bananas rather than the monkeys? This construction might be well-chosen for a piece of non-fiction writing concerning bananas
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If the sentence contains "is" or "are" and a past participle ("followed"), then it is probably written in the passive voice
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Focus on what "the gymnast" does and you will see that this is active voice
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It is "Dad" who does the verb and this again is active voice
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The construction "are taken" is passive
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If you have found this quiz difficult then don't worry. The great majority of adults have no idea whether a sentence is written in the active or passive voice!
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