Question

Fill in the blanks with the appropriate tense:
It looked as though he ______ this before. (do)
a) is not doing
b) will do
c) had done
d) none of the above

Answer 1

Hint:The given sentence contains the word ‘before’. This is an indication that this particular situation has happened before, or it looks like it has. This leads us to a particular tense.

Complete answer:
In the given sentence, the narrator is saying that it appears as though he has done this before. However, the first verb is in the past tense. So, the second verb should match in this case. This means that the blank should be filled with a verb that shows a completed action. This means that the required tense is past perfect tense.

Now, we know the meaning and the context of the sentence. Let’s go through the options one by one:

a) is not doing - This construction has been made by adding the helping verb ‘is’ to the given verb’s continuous form ‘doing’, which has been made by adding the suffix ‘-ing’. This is not the past perfect tense. This is the present continuous tense. This tense conveys that the action has started and is ongoing. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.
b) will do - This construction has been made by adding the future tense helping verb ‘will’ to the half infinitive ‘do’. This is not the past perfect tense. This is the simple future tense. This tense conveys that the action is going to happen in the future, without a time specification. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.
c) had done - This construction has been made by adding the past tense helping verb ‘had’ to the past participle of the given verb ‘do’. This is the past perfect tense. This is the required answer, as it fits perfectly into the context of the given sentence. So, this is the correct answer.
d) none of the above - This option is incorrect as we have already found the correct answer from the above options.

Note:
Try to understand the meaning of the sentence. This will help you gauge which tense to use. Discover the words that point to a certain tense. Then, go through the given options and choose the correct answer accordingly.