First Foreign Language (English): Reading, Grammar and Writing
First Foreign Language (English) in Thanawiya Amma tests reading comprehension, vocabulary in context, grammar and structure, and guided writing or translation. Questions reward precise meaning, not guessed answers.
Core rules
- Present perfect is used for experience or a result connected to now, with 'since' for a point in time and 'for' for a duration.
- Past simple is used for a finished action at a finished time.
- Conditional type 2: if + past simple, would + infinitive, for an unreal present.
- Conditional type 3: if + had + past participle, would have + past participle, for an unreal past.
- Passive: the object becomes subject; the verb is the correct form of 'be' + past participle.
- Reported speech: backshift one tense and adjust pronouns and time markers.
- Relative clauses: who for people, which for things, that in defining clauses; commas change meaning.
Worked example
'If she had revised, she would have passed.' This is type 3. The if-clause uses 'had revised' (past perfect); the main clause uses 'would have passed' (would + have + past participle). Both actions are unreal past. Do not write 'would have' in the if-clause.
Traps
- Using 'since' with a duration and 'for' with a point in time.
- Confusing 'used to' (past habit) with 'be used to + -ing' (be accustomed to).
- Subject-verb agreement with 'each', 'every' and 'neither'.
- Answering reading questions from personal opinion rather than text evidence.
- Exceeding the word limit in the writing task.