1. Thomas ____ there but a minute when his girl friend arrived. (be)
2. Some kids ____ to tears with the ordinary textbooks when they entered high school. (bore)
(What is the suitable forms of the verbs of the parentheses in the blanks/)
3. Robert announced that he was ____ out of college.
(Can I enter 'dropped' in the blank to complete the sentence?)
1. had been
2. were bored
3. Dropped would work if you change the helping verb to has or had.
3. Robert announced that he was dropped out of college.
(Thank you for your help. Is this sentence right in grammar? What other expressions can we use instead of 'dropped'?)
That is not the usual way of stating that idea.
If he leaves college on his own, then we can say he dropped out. If the college makes him leave, then say he was expelled or suspended from college.
Do you see the difference between the active and passive voices here?
Ok. Thank you.
You're welcome.
1. The suitable form of the verb "be" in the blank is "was". To determine this, you should recognize that the sentence is talking about a past event, indicated by the use of the word "minute" in the statement. As a result, we need to use the past tense of the verb "be," which is "was". So, the sentence would be: "Thomas was there but a minute when his girlfriend arrived."
2. The suitable form of the verb "bore" in the blank is "bored". To determine this, we need to consider the subject of the sentence, which is "some kids". In this case, we also have a past event as indicated by the use of the word "entered" in the statement. When using the past tense for "bore" with the subject "some kids", we use the past participle form, which is "bored". So, the sentence would be: "Some kids were bored to tears with the ordinary textbooks when they entered high school."
3. Yes, you can use the word "dropped" in the blank to complete the sentence. The sentence you provided, "Robert announced that he was dropped out of college," however, needs a slight modification to be grammatically correct. Instead, it should be: "Robert announced that he had dropped out of college." In this case, we use "had dropped" because it is referring to an action that happened in the past before the announcement was made.