Agreement and the Compound Subject in a Khasi Sentence
In a grammar test, 28 candidates are asked to correct: 'U nonghikai bad ki khynnah u la leit sha ka jingïaseng.' The intended correction is 'ki la leit' because the subject is compound and includes a plural noun. One candidate writes 'U nonghikai bad ki khynnah ki la leit' and adds, 'The teacher is the main subject, so u is also correct.' Another candidate writes 'U nonghikai bad ki khynnah ki la leit' but cannot explain why. A third leaves it unchanged, saying Khasi has no subject-verb agreement. The item is worth 2 marks: 1 for the correction and 1 for the reason. The teacher must decide whether to award full credit to the first candidate, whether the third candidate's claim has any merit, and how to phrase feedback that distinguishes agreement from emphasis.
1. Decide the mark for each of the three candidates and justify the rulings.
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Candidate 1 gets 1/2. The correction is right, but the reason is wrong: a compound subject with 'ki khynnah' is plural, so the agreement marker is 'ki'. The teacher should not award the reason mark for a right answer with a wrong rule, because the same reasoning would fail in a new sentence. Candidate 2 gets 2/2 if the answer shows 'ki' is used because the subject is plural; if no explanation is given, 1/2. Candidate 3 gets 0/2: Khasi verbs do not inflect, but the pronoun before the verb is a subject/agreement marker; the sentence is ungrammatical because 'u' clashes with 'ki khynnah'.
2. Explain the grammatical principle in a way suitable for feedback to the class.
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Khasi does not add -s to the verb; agreement is carried by the pronoun or clitic before the verb phrase. With 'U nonghikai bad ki khynnah', the subject is mixed and plural, so 'ki' is the neutral plural marker. 'U' would be defensible only if the teacher were singled out for emphasis, for example 'U nonghikai, u la leit...' with a pause and contrast; the original sentence has no such marking. Feedback should therefore say: 'Your correction is right, but your reason is not. The subject is plural, so the marker is ki, not u. The verb itself does not change.'
3. Write a diagnostic item that separates number agreement from emphasis.
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Give two pairs. Pair A: 'Ka kmie bad ki khun ki la wan' versus 'Ka kmie bad ki khun ka la wan' - ask which is correct and why. Pair B: 'U nonghikai u la wan' versus 'U nonghikai, u la wan' - ask whether the second is ungrammatical or emphatic. Pair A tests plural agreement; Pair B tests emphasis. A candidate who says both members of Pair B are wrong has confused agreement with emphasis and needs the feedback from the previous task.