Language Use: Grammar and Structure
What this domain tests
Grammar is tested inside technical sentences, not as isolated theory: verb forms in instructions and reports, passive voice, modal verbs for rules and risks, conditionals, relative clauses, agreement and countable/uncountable nouns.
Tense choices
Instructions use the imperative: 'Switch off the supply.' General facts and permanent properties use the present simple: 'The pump supplies oil to the bearing.' A finished incident is reported in the past simple: 'The belt snapped at 09:40.' The present perfect links a completed action to now: 'The guard has been removed, so the machine is unsafe.' Planned procedures often use is/are to be: 'The filter is to be replaced every 500 hours.'
Passive voice
Technical writing uses the passive when the doer is unknown or unimportant: 'The cable must be earthed before the cover is replaced.' Form it with the correct tense of be + past participle. Do not drop the auxiliary: 'the cover replaced' is wrong.
Modals
Must = obligation; must not = prohibition; should = recommendation; may/might = possibility; can = ability or permission; need not = no obligation. 'The guard must be fitted' is a rule; 'the guard should be fitted' is advice.
Conditionals
Zero conditional for general rules: 'If the light comes on, the filter is blocked.' First conditional for real future warnings: 'If the alarm sounds, leave the area immediately.' Do not use will in the if-clause.
Agreement and quantity
Units are singular: 'Ten centimetres is enough.' 'A number of bolts are missing' (plural) but 'the number of bolts is rising' (singular). Equipment, machinery, information and advice are uncountable: no plural -s and no 'an'.
Worked example
'If the warning light ___ (come) on, stop the engine.' Reasoning: the main clause is imperative, so this is a zero/first conditional pattern; the if-clause takes the present simple, not will. Answer: comes.
Traps that cost marks
- will in the if-clause.
- must and mustn't reversed.
- Missing be in the passive.
- Pluralising uncountable nouns (equipments, informations).
- Wrong agreement after a number of / the number of.