Understanding Active and Passive Voice Conversion

This question asks us to convert a sentence from active voice to passive voice. Let's first understand what active and passive voice mean in English grammar.

• Active Voice: The subject of the sentence performs the action. Example: "Who teaches you English?" Here, "Who" is the subject performing the action "teaches".
• Passive Voice: The subject of the sentence receives the action. The focus shifts to the action and the receiver of the action. The original subject is often mentioned at the end, introduced by "by". Example: "English is taught to you." Here, "English" (the receiver) is the subject.

Converting 'Who teaches you English?' to Passive Voice

The given sentence is "Who teaches you English?" This is a question in the simple present tense. The active voice structure is: Who (subject) + verb (teaches) + indirect object (you) + direct object (English)?

When converting 'Who' questions in active voice to passive voice, 'Who' typically changes to 'By whom'. The object(s) in the active voice sentence become the subject in the passive voice sentence.

In this sentence, there are two possible objects: 'you' (indirect object) and 'English' (direct object). We can form a passive sentence using either as the subject.

Analyzing the Passive Voice Options

Let's examine each option to see which correctly converts the original simple present tense sentence "Who teaches you English?" into the passive voice.

Based on the analysis, Option 3 correctly converts the simple present active voice sentence "Who teaches you English?" to the simple present passive voice question "By whom are you taught English?".

Correct Passive Voice Transformation

The original sentence is in the simple present active voice:

\(\text{Who (Subject)} + \text{teaches (Simple Present Verb)} + \text{you (Indirect Object)} + \text{English (Direct Object)?}\)

To convert this 'Who' question to passive voice, 'Who' becomes 'By whom'. We can choose either 'you' or 'English' as the subject of the passive sentence. The verb must remain in the simple present tense passive form (is/am/are + past participle).

Using 'you' as the passive subject:

\(\text{By whom} + \text{are (Helping Verb for Simple Present Passive)} + \text{you (Passive Subject)} + \text{taught (Past Participle of teach)} + \text{English?}\)

This gives us: "By whom are you taught English?"

Using 'English' as the passive subject:

\(\text{By whom} + \text{is (Helping Verb for Simple Present Passive)} + \text{English (Passive Subject)} + \text{taught (Past Participle of teach)} + \text{to you?}\)

This would give us: "By whom is English taught to you?" (Option 4 is close but uses the wrong tense 'was taught').

Comparing the correct passive forms with the given options, "By whom are you taught English?" is present as Option 3, and it is a grammatically correct passive transformation in the simple present tense.

Revision Table: Active vs Passive Voice

Additional Information: Voice Change in English Grammar

Changing the voice of a sentence allows us to shift emphasis. Passive voice is often used when the doer of the action is unknown, unimportant, or obvious from the context, or when we want to emphasize the action or its receiver.

Key points about voice change:

• Only transitive verbs (verbs that take an object) can be changed into passive voice.
• The tense of the verb remains the same during the conversion; only the verb form changes to 'be + past participle'.
• Questions in active voice remain questions in passive voice, often requiring inversion of the helping verb and subject.
• Sentences starting with 'Who' in active voice questions become 'By whom' in passive voice questions. Sentences starting with 'Whom' in active voice questions become 'Who' in passive voice questions.

Understanding these rules is crucial for correctly transforming sentences between active and passive voice in English grammar.