The answers to yesterday's quiz are as follows:
1. Correct Answer – A – teachers'
"The school principal tended to spend more of her free time in the hallways with students than in the teachers' lounge with faculty members." If there were only one teacher in the school, then teacher's would be correct. Since the sentence mentions "faculty members," we can assume that the school has more than one teacher. This makes it plural possessive: The apostrophe is at the end of the plural form of the word, making teachers' the correct usage. Teachers has no possessive, and would be incorrect in either case.
2. Correct Answer – B – e.g.
"He often incorporated several kinds of media into his art, e.g., clay, glass, and wood." When you are explaining something, i.e. (short for the Latin id est, or "that is") is the one to use. When listing examples, e.g. (short for the Latin expression exempli gratia, or "for the sake of example") is correct. The expression et al. comes from another Latin expression, et alii, meaning "and others," so it would be inappropriate here.
3. Correct Answer – A – too
"You are taking my comments too personally." Too is an adverb that means "excessively" or "also," as in "She spent too much," or "He plays chess,too." To is a preposition that begins a prepositional phrase (e.g., I drove to the store) or an infinitive (e.g., She likes to knit). Two is a number and would not be correct in this sentence.
4. Correct Answer – C – is
"Neither Derek nor Denny is in the building." When two singular subjects are connected by neither/nor or either/or, a singular verb is required. The answer options are and were are both plural verbs, so they're inappropriate for this sentence. The singular verb is (or was, if in the past tense) is correct.
5. Correct Answer – A – do
"Christina is one of the doctors who do rounds at 10 a.m." When the pronoun who is the subject of the verb in the middle of the sentence, it becomes singular or plural depending on the noun in front of it. In this instance, doctors is plural, so the plural verb do is correct. Done is one way of expressing do in the past tense, but it needs another verb, as in the phrase "the doctors have done their rounds."
6. Correct Answer – B – that
"Finn is on the team that rode the bus to the stadium." That refers to things or groups. Who and whom refer to people. In this sentence, that refers to the noun team.
7. Correct Answer – C – off
"Please move your dirty feet off the table." It's usually unnecessary to combine more than one preposition (e.g., of, on, at, and with), especially if the meaning is already clear–hence, the preposition off alone is sufficient in this sentence. Off of is incorrect (and kind of awkward to say, besides). Of, a word with many usages and meanings, would also be incorrect in this case.
8. Correct Answer – B – among
"George divided the bananas among the three monkeys." Among is always used in connection to more than two persons or things, whereas between is used for just two.
9. Correct Answer – A – a lot
"Addison had a lot of friends at her new school." There is no such word as alot (written as one word). An adjectival phrase, a lot is always two words. Allot is a verb meaning "to distribute or apportion."
10. Correct Answer – B – because of
"Burke missed his flight because of the heavy rush-hour traffic." Due to means "caused by," and should only be used if you can substitute caused by. It is not interchangeable with because of, the most appropriate phrase for this sentence. Due to the fact of is a wordy and unnecessary expression that is best replaced by because of.
That's probably more than you ever needed (or wanted) to know, but I gathered from the number of comments that there was at least some interest there. These answers above are courtesy of MSN Encarta. More quizzes here.