Hammer Your PSLE Grammar

Generated in Stable Diffusion with the prompt “stressed student, hands on hair, classroom setting”

I was studying about PSLE grammar questions today. I thought to use ChatGPT to generate the grammar questions that you can practise on to improve your English. After some iterations, I settled on something like this, which in GPT3.5 Turbo, gives some decent results. (Note: GPT4 is still much better)

DISCLAIMER: This is no official PSLE guide. It’s an experimental attempt to see how good ChatGPT can generate the PSLE grammar questions. If it helps you, appreciate a “clap” 👏. If it doesn’t, I hope you at least picked up some prompting tips. Recognise that all Large Language Models can hallucinate and give you wrong or inaccurate responses.

Here’s the prompt I used.

Let’s see how ChatGPT performs using GPT3.5 Turbo.

🤖ChatGPT (3.5 Turbo):

Absolutely, I’m here to help! Here’s your first grammar question:

“John and Emily have _____ finished their science project.” (1) yet (2) already (3) just (4) still

Please provide your answer, and I’ll let you know if you’re right or wrong, along with an explanation.

Ok, quite good. It recognises the examples that I gave it, and formats the question in exactly the way I want it to. In an earlier iteration, I tried the prompt without giving it the “few shots” examples and it wasn’t as good.

🧑‍💻Me:

2

🤖ChatGPT (3.5 Turbo):

Correct! The answer is:

(2) already

Explanation: The sentence “John and Emily have already finished their science project” uses the present perfect tense with the adverb “already” to indicate that the action of finishing the science project happened at some point before now. “Already” is commonly used with the present perfect tense to show that something has happened sooner than expected or earlier than a specific time. Well done!

Now, let’s move on to the next question:

“Rohan is good at playing the guitar, _____?” (1) isn’t he? (2) doesn’t he? (3) is he? (4) does he?

This is quite a good explanation! Good to see that ChatGPT follows the instructions to provide explanations after I answered. It’ll help the learners know why the question is correct, as sometimes you may not know the detailed principles behind an answer even if you instinctively know your grammar well.

I also like how it obeyed the prompt “Then immediately ask the next question.” to immediately give the next question. In an earlier iteration without this liner, it asks me if I want to continue after each question, which can be quite cumbersome.

🧑‍💻Me:

2

🤖ChatGPT (3.5 Turbo):

I’m sorry, but the correct answer is:

(1) isn’t he?

Explanation: The correct question tag for the sentence “Rohan is good at playing the guitar” is “isn’t he?” This is because the main clause is in a positive statement, so the question tag should be negative. The subject is “Rohan,” and the verb in the main clause is “is,” so the corresponding question tag is “isn’t he?” Keep practicing!

Let’s continue with the next question:

“I _____ my homework when the power outage occurred.” (1) was doing (2) did (3) have done (4) do

When the wrong answer is given, ChatGPT points it out, and provides the correct answer instead with an explanation.

🧑‍💻Me:

stop

🤖ChatGPT (3.5 Turbo):

Of course! If you have any more grammar questions in the future or need further assistance, feel free to ask. Happy learning!

In this short trial, it is also heartening to see that ChatGPT varies its questions because of my prompt asking it to test me on the various topics (a) general grammar to (k) connector questions. What is interesting as well as is that it knows to vary the position of the answers, although this is a hit-or-miss; there are some times when it keeps putting the correct answers in option 1 and 2.

Now, let’s try with GPT4.

🤖ChatGPT (GPT4):

Alright, let’s start the test! I’ll begin with a question on general grammar.

“Despite their differences, neither Susan _____ Rachel wanted to argue.”

1. and
2. nor
3. or
4. but

What’s your answer?

🧑‍💻Me:

2

🤖ChatGPT (GPT4):

Correct!

“Neither … nor” is a correlative conjunction pair that is used to indicate that neither of the two mentioned things is true or correct.

Let’s move on to a question on prepositions:

“The cake is _____ the fridge.”

1. in
2. on
3. at
4. to

What’s your answer?

🧑‍💻Me:

1

🤖ChatGPT (GPT4):

Correct!

We use “in” to indicate that something is inside a space, like “in the fridge”.

Next, let’s test question tags:

“He can swim, _____?”

1. isn’t he?
2. can he?
3. can’t he?
4. does he?

What’s your answer?

🧑‍💻Me:

3

🤖ChatGPT (GPT4):

Correct!

The question tag for “He can swim” is “can’t he?”. If the statement is positive, the tag is usually negative and vice versa.

Next, let’s tackle tenses:

If she _____ the news earlier, she would have come.

1. knows
2. knew
3. had known
4. would know

What’s your answer?

🧑‍💻Me:

2

🤖ChatGPT (GPT4):

Actually, the correct answer is:

had known

The sentence is using the third conditional which talks about a condition in the past that did not happen. For this reason, we use “had” + past participle (known) for the condition, followed by “would have” + past participle for the result.

Now, a question on modal verbs:

If you’re not sure about the answer, you _____ ask the teacher.

1. should
2. can
3. might
4. must

What’s your answer?

Not too bad!

Hope you enjoyed this. Next up … let’s try to use this prompt to generate PSLE vocabulary questions. =)