Question

Fill the blank with most appropriate word-
“_________ your friend speak English?”
“No, she _________”
a) Is/isn’t
b) Can/can’t
c) Could/could
d) Can/can

Answer 1

Hint: There is a question asked in the first statement and then its answer is given in the second one. We have to fill in the blank to complete the question, as well as the answer.

Complete answer:
In the given question, both the blanks have to be filled in with the same word, in a negative and positive form. So, pay attention to the given options. The first blank has to be filled with a positive word, whereas the second one has to be filled with a negative word. Generally, in question tag questions, we use contrasting words. Also, the second statement has a ‘no’ is it, which means it has to have a negative word.
Now, let us examine all the given option to find out the correct answer -
Option ‘a' is Is/isn’t. It cannot be the correct answer as we cannot use ‘is’ with ‘speak' in the given question. It would be grammatically incorrect.
Option ‘b’ is Can/can’t. It is the correct answer as we can use ‘can’ with ‘your friend speak'. And we can also use ‘can't' as a contrasting word for the statement blank.
Option ‘c’ is Could/could. It cannot be the correct answer as both the words are positive and we cannot use the same words in both of the blanks.
Option ‘d’ is Can/can. Both words are also positive and we cannot use the same words in the given blanks. So, we will eliminate this option.
As we have analyzed all the given option we can easily figure out the correct option. Here, the correct words to be filled in the blanks are – can/can’t. The complete sentence would be – Can your friend speak English? No, she can’t. Hence, option ‘b’ is the correct option.

Note:
Keep in mind that such questions will always have contrasting words, the statement and the question tag, both. All the other options are plausible distractions.