Active and passive voice
English · Grammar & Punctuation · procedural
Use the passive voice to shift focus from the agent to the action or recipient, understanding how passive constructions affect the presentation of information in formal and objective writing
What mastery looks like
- Convert active sentences to passive voice and explain the change in emphasis
- Identify passive constructions in news reports and scientific writing
- Choose between active and passive voice based on purpose and audience
Check your understanding
When Active and passive voice wants to write about something without saying who did it — like in a science report — can they switch the sentence round to say "The experiment was carried out" instead of "We carried out the experiment"?
Prerequisites
Required first