Discover your grammar weaknesses

This book improves your English grammar knowledge

by Mehdi Safavi | Aug 8, 2019 | Grammar

“I’m not very good in English grammar”, say many English learners, “and I want to improve, but I don’t really know where to start.” In this lesson, we are going to introduce a book to you that will help you to check what you know, and what you don’t know, about English grammar and usage. By using these tests, you can discover what you need to learn.

What’s the book?

The book is titled “Grammar Scan” by the world-famous authors Micheal Swan and David Baker. It is basically a test book at three levels:

Upper Intermediate
Advanced
Expert

How does it work?

Choose the level that you think is right for you.
Answer the questions.
Check your answers in the key at the back of the book.
If you get some answers wrong, the answer key will show you where in Practical English Usage (3rd Edition) you can find the explanations you need for each point.
Go to Practical English Usage (3rd Edition) and read the explanations.
Try the test again, preferably a few days later, and see if you can do better.

Sample test from the book

Question

Which of these present tenses forms is/are correctly used?

A. What are frogs usually eating?
B. The kettle boils. ~ Please take it off the stove.
C. Water boils at 100? Celsius.
D. I’m playing tennis every Wednesday.
E. Alice works for an insurance company.
F. Look – it snows!

Answer key

C and E are correct.
See 463.1 and 463.2 [from Practical English Usage]

A word of advice

Remember: grammar is not the only part of a language that has to be learnt and practiced; it is not even the most important part. Don’t get obsessed with correctness; otherwise, you will end up just learning grammar instead of learning English. Use this book sensibly, in moderation, to help you meet your own personal needs.

About the Author

CEO and Co-founder of Juice Academy

Mehdi Safavi is a Cambridge certified English teacher (CELTA Grade A), IDP-trained IELTS expert, Sussex Downs College TESOL with 17+ years of teaching & teacher training experience. More about him →