Choose the Best Answer

Choose the best answer:

The children______ playing in the yard.
a. am
b. is
c. are
d. were

Jimmy ________ to stay at home after school.
a. like
b. likes
c. liking
d. liked

These are a couple of typical examples of multiple choice questions that appear in high school exams across Thailand. Both questions do of course have two possible answers. These questions were devised by a foreign, non-native English speaker for an exam that was peppered with mistakes, ambiguity and, frankly, stupidity. Experience tells me that this is the norm. It is also the norm that exams prepared by Thai teachers are riddled with errors.

So, if the teachers cannot get it right, then how the hell is the poor student supposed to manage?
The answer is they don't; despite these simple questions having two possible answers most of the students, all who have had more that 12 years of English tuition, came up with the wrong answers.

Oh, and by the way apparently Canberra isn't the capital of Australia. Rather the capital is:
a. Sydney. b. Perth c. Melbourne. or d. Darwin.

Choose the best answer!