Grammar and Language Elements
What the domain tests
Grammar questions check control of Persian alphabet and sound distinctions, pronouns, nouns and plurals, ezafe construction, prepositions, verb stems and endings, and basic sentence order. The exam often uses fill-in-the-blank, matching, correction, and sentence-formation items.
Core rules
- Ezafe: link a noun to a following modifier or possessor with an unstressed -e: کتابِ نو (new book), خانۀ احمد (Ahmad’s house).
- Subject-verb agreement: من میروم (I go), او میرود (he/she goes), ما میرویم (we go).
- Past stem and present stem differ: رفت / رو (went / go-), گفت / گو (said / say-).
- را marks a specific direct object: کتاب را خواندم (I read the book).
- Basic order is subject–object–verb: احمد نامه را نوشت (Ahmad wrote the letter).
Worked example
Fill in: این کتابِ ____ است. (This is the book of ____.) If the cue is من (I), the correct form is من: این کتابِ من است - “This is my book.” Reasoning: Persian possession is expressed with ezafe plus the pronoun, not with a separate possessive adjective like English “my”. Do not write کتابِ میاست or omit the ezafe.
Traps that cost marks
- Dropping ezafe in reading or writing: کتاب احمد can be ambiguous without ِ.
- Using را with an indefinite or non-specific object where it is not needed.
- Mixing present and past stems: میرفتم (I was going) versus میروم (I go).
- Wrong plural: کتابها for inanimate nouns, but some Arabic borrowings take broken plurals.
- Forgetting that Persian verbs normally come at the end.