Teaching English as a Foreign Language

248 Part IV: The Grammar You Need to Know – and How to Teach It

✓ can

✓ could

✓ may

✓ might

✓ must

✓ shall

✓ should

✓ ought to

✓ will

✓ would

Even though you can create a short sentence with just a modal verb and no

main verb, the main verb is understood because of the rest of the interchange:

A: Yes, I can.

B: You can what?

A: Go to the office, of course.

When you put all these modal verbs into a sentence you find that they go

between the subject, words such as ‘you’ and ‘we’, and the main verb, as

shown in Table 17-1.

Table 17-1 Sentence Structure with Modal Verbs

Subject Modal Verb Main Verb Object

The tourists should go home

They might follow us

She will not like that

In questions, the word order is different though, so the subject word goes

between the modal verb and the main verb. Table 17-2 offers some examples.

Table 17-2 Sentence Structure with Modal Verbs and Objects

Question word Modal Verb Subject Main Verb Object

When should the tourists go home?

How might they follow us?

Why won’t she like that?