e· ExamHubENGLISH WORKBOOK TRAINER
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SECTION 02 · Gaps in a connected text

Cloze test

Choose a separate exercise.

40 exercises
Exercise 24Book 3 · Section 2 · 24 / 40
How to solve: Cloze testA connected text with numbered gaps; choose a, b, c or d for each gap.

What it tests

Grammar in context: tenses and their sequence, modal verbs, linking words, verb patterns and fixed phrases.

In the exam: part II, 17 tasks.

Step by step

  1. Read the whole paragraph first — the time frame (past, present, future) is often set by the sentences around the gap.
  2. Look at what comes right before and after the gap: a subject, an auxiliary, a preposition, “to”…
  3. Decide what kind of word fits (verb form, linking word, preposition) before looking at the options.
  4. Check time signals: ago, since, by the time, already, while, tomorrow.
  5. Read the sentence again with your answer — it must sound complete and logical.

Watch out for

  • Choosing a tense from the sentence alone when the paragraph is clearly in the past.
  • Mixing up similar forms: had done / has done / did, to do / doing.
  • Linking words with opposite meaning: because / although, so / but.

Example

By the time we arrived, the film (1)____. a) has started b) had started c) starts d) was starting

b) had started — “by the time we arrived” marks a past moment; the film started before it, so we need the past perfect.

Exercise 24
EXERCISE TEXT

When Jock McHaverty was a little boy, he 1 to be a bus driver. His father hoped he 2 into the family business, and his mother would have liked him to be a doctor. But Jock just 3. He loved buses – all kinds of buses. He loved the way they looked, the smell of the diesel fuel, and most of all, the wonderful noise they 4. When he was fourteen, he went on his first real holiday – a bus trip to the south of England and back. And when he 5 school two years later, he went straight into the Highland Bus Company.

Gap 1
Gap 2
Gap 3
Gap 4
Gap 5