Shifts in verb voice and mood worksheets

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When two parts of a sentence do the same job, keep them in the same voice and mood. Do not start a set of steps as commands and finish them as a statement.

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  1. 7th grade Core grade

    Examples and teaching notes

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    A shift in voice happens when a sentence starts active and slides into the passive, or the reverse. A shift in mood happens when a sentence starts as a command and finishes as a statement. Seventh graders find the shift and rewrite the sentence so the second half matches the opening clause.

  2. 8th grade

    Examples and teaching notes

    In eighth grade the sentences get longer and the shifts get harder to hear. Voice can slide either way, active into passive or passive into active. Mood can slide from a command into a statement, or from the subjunctive into the indicative, as in if I were older and I was allowed. Students rewrite each sentence so the verbs that do the same job match. Parts that do different jobs can differ: in the manual recommends that the battery be charged and that the user wait a day, the two that-clauses share the subjunctive, while be charged stays passive and wait stays active.

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