We have talked about what a sentence has to have—a subject and verb. But they can’t be just any subject and verb; they have to match in person and number. So, what does that mean?
Person indicates whom the speaker or writer is talking about or talking to. First person means the speaker is referring to or describing himself or herself—I am. Second person means the sentence is addressed to or describing the audience—you are. Third person means the sentence describes or refers to someone or something that is neither the speaker nor the audience—he/she/it is.
Then there is number—singular or plural. The previous examples are all singular in number. We are, you are, they are—that’s first person plural, second person plural, and third person plural.
All the given examples match in person and number. You wouldn’t say, I are a good student. That’s a pretty easy mistake to spot, but it can get trickier. Here are some of the easy-to-miss situations.
Do not get distracted by phrases that come between the subject and verb. Take a look at this sentence and see if you can tell which verb is correct:
Officer Prince, who spends many days off jumping with an elite group of skydivers, remain/remains calm under the most stressful circumstances.
The right answer is the singular form, remains. Even though there is a plural noun right before the verb, the subject of the sentence is Officer Prince, a singular noun. Everything between the commas just gives you more information about the singular subject.
Another tricky situation occurs when you have a sentence in which the subject is a list of some kind.
The applicant told the interviewers that his drive, determination, and intelligence makes/make him an ideal recruit.
The correct answer is make—that list of three singular nouns combined with the word and adds up to one compound subject, which requires a plural verb.
As if compound subjects weren’t difficult enough, there are some sentences that seem to have compound subjects when they really don’t. Watch out for phrases containing or beginning with neither/nor, either/or, along with, as well as, or in addition to. These are the compound impostors.
Neither the rookie nor the old-timer knows/know how to handle the situation.
Here, the right answer is the singular verb—knows—even though this looks like a list of two nouns. To make it clearer, rewrite the sentence as, Neither one knows how to handle the situation. That is the implied meaning of either/or and neither/nor.
However, what if you had rookies and old-timers?
Neither the rookies nor the old-timers knows/know how to handle the situation.
Here the sentence takes a plural verb, know. That is because you are dealing with plural subjects.
Officer Tremblay, along with half of the 9th Precinct, was/were a rabid softball player.
The sentence takes a singular verb—was. Officer Tremblay is the real subject of the sentence. The phrase along with half of the 9th Precinct is just a kind of detour; grammatically, it doesn’t become part of the subject.