Crafting Vocabulary and Sentence Variety: Question 8
Syllabus W3
Read the situation below.
A local newspaper is reporting on a break-in. At the time of writing, nobody has been identified as responsible for smashing the shop's front window, and the report needs to focus on the window itself rather than on an unknown person.
Which sentence is the most effective choice for the report, given this situation?
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Worked solution
Assessment focus
This tests whether a candidate can recognise when the passive voice, rather than the active voice, is the more deliberate and effective choice. Here, because the person responsible for the break-in is not known and the report needs to focus on the window itself.
Why C is correct
“The shop’s front window was smashed overnight” uses the passive voice, which grammatically allows the agent (whoever smashed the window) to be left out altogether while still keeping the fact, that the window was deliberately smashed, completely clear. The window, the genuinely important detail in this report, becomes the subject of the sentence.
Why the distractors are wrong
- A (Someone smashed…) is active voice with a vague subject, “someone,” a less natural way of achieving the same omission the passive voice manages more smoothly.
- B (…window smashed overnight) removes the auxiliary verb “was,” which changes the meaning entirely: it now suggests the window broke on its own, with no person responsible at all.
- D (An unidentified individual…) is active voice, and, though accurate, it is wordier than necessary and draws attention to the unknown person rather than the window, working against the report’s focus.
Mark scheme
- 1 mark for selecting C.
- 0 marks for any other option. No partial credit, since this is a discrete single-answer selection question.