Teacher Discussion Forums

Here is a question from a multiple choice test. Thanks in advance for your answers and explanations. Please explain why the wrong answers are wrong.

This is the shipwreck I've always been mentioning you. There are stork nests now ___ were once used as portholes for cannonballs.

A-what
B-which
C-in what
D-where
E-in which

I'm not really up to telling you exactly why they are wrong as they stand, but I could start out by showing how they could be made "right":

WHAT were once (used as) portholes for cannonballs/are stork nests now (or, '...are now stork nests').

(There are stork nests now WHICH were once used as portholes for cannonballs, although grammatically correct, makes absolutely no meaningful sense at all and is rather silly).

(Whilst 'IN WHAT' is the "correct" answer (right?), it still sounds a bit strange, the sentence would be greatly improved if it ran, There are stork nests now in what were once portholes for cannonballs, but I guess that the original kind of "runaway" sentences do sometimes occur even in natural English).

There are stork nests now WHERE once were portholes for cannonballs. (a marked word order, ooh-ar!)

I'm having a really hard time juggling 'IN WHICH' around, I don't think it can be made to make much sense at all.

All some genius now has to do is say something like, 'In the corrected examples, the item is functioning as a _____, whereas in the incorrect examples, it....(?!#%$&!? Aargh!!!)....and is therefore incorrect.'

Apologies, it is now past 4am here!

The question is grammatically wrong, and clearly written by somebody who has not mastered English. Scrap it and don't waste any more sleep on it.

You could do what Stephen suggests also!

Yeah I have to say I didn't think much of the test item either.

I'll add my vote to Stephen's comment here, Stefan. The question is confusing because it is poorly written to begin with. But even if I screw it around in my brain a bit so that I can figure out what probably the test writer wanted to say, then none of the answers are quite "right" in my book, although "(c) in what" comes closest. Perhaps we should add: (f) none of the above.

Larry Latham

Well, as an afterthought, I guess, since we've criticized the question we ought to offer an improvement:

Here's the shipwreck I've mentioned. There are stork's nests now ______ once were portholes for cannonballs.

A-what
B-which
C-in what
D-where
E-in which

Two correct answers exist here, both "C" and "D". Probably the answer list should be revised too to eliminate one of these.

Please note: This is not the only way in which the question can be re-written. Many other grammatically viable possibilities exist.

You b*stard, Larry, you lifted that almost straight out of my post!

Thanks for your answers. Unfortunately, we often find sentences like this in Turkish English books, obviously not written by native speakers. I'll act on Stephen's advice.
S.

I like the idea of portholes for cannonballs. "Now chaps be careful when you aim the cannons because the balls must go through those holes. Push a bit of cannon through the hole? What a ridiculous idea"

"Now chaps be careful when you aim the cannons because the balls must go through those holes. Push a bit of cannon through the hole? What a ridiculous idea"

I hope you don't think I have an unhealthy obsession with guns, having made the joke about a magnum in another thread; I don't.

I've always thought that in disarmament talks, one way to get the ball rolling would be to cast a symbolic ploughshare from the metal of guns handed in by both sides, and stick it on a plinth with a plaque also made from the metal saying so.

Nevertheless, and now back on topic, the correct term here is "gun port."

I would have thought it would be both difficult and dangerous to fire a gun through a port hole.

Andrew Patterson wrote:Nevertheless, and now back on topic, the correct term here is "gun port."

I would have thought it would be both difficult and dangerous to fire a gun through a port hole.

I suppose if you were really linguistically challenged you could say "boom boom hole".

As Basil Brush would say, "Boom boom!". He's been boom-booming a long time, hasn't he! (Apologies to all non-Brits who probably won't get the "cultural" allusion).