Article Exercise

Fill in the blank with the appropriate article, a, an, or the, or leave the space blank if no article is needed.

1. I want ____ apple from that basket.

2. ____ church on the corner is progressive.

3. Miss Lin speaks ____ Chinese.

4. I borrowed ____ pencil from your pile of pencils and pens.

5. One of the students said, "____ professor is late today."

6 Eli likes to play ____ volleyball.

7. I bought ____ umbrella to go out in the rain.

8. My daughter is learning to play ____ violin at her school.

9. Please give me ____ cake that is on the counter.

10. I lived on ____ Main Street when I first came to town.

11. Albany is the capital of ____ New York State.

12. My husband's family speaks ____ Polish.

13. ____ apple a day keeps the doctor away.

14. ____ ink in my pen is red.

15. Our neighbors have ____ cat and ____ dog.

16. Last year we moved to ____ Guangzhou.

17. ____ kitchen is ____ door on your left.

18. _____ weather is very hot in August.

19. There isn’t ____ table in ____ kitchen.

20. Would you like ____ drink?

21. I’m sorry, he’s still at ____ work.

22. There’s ____ radio in ____ living room.

23. Would you like ____ cup of ____ tea?

24. They’ve got ____ large house in ____ center of town.

25. We’ve got ____ son and ____ two daughters.

26. ____ children are outside in ____ garden.

27. What’s ____ main room in your flat?

28. She spoke ____ very good French at ____ home.

29. I flew to ____ Lyon and spent ____ two weeks in ____ Alps.

Choose the correct article a, an, the, or x if no article is needed.

I went to the/x Netherlands to visit my friends.
The/x United States invaded the/x Irag.
The/A/An/x Pope is the head at the/x Vatican.
I read the/a/x book Tom Sawyer for my book report.
Somebody please call the/a/x policeman.
When I was at the/a/x zoo, I saw a/an/the/x elephant.
He plans to enter a/an/the/x university next year.
Mary is good at a/the/x mathematics.
This is a/an/the/x unusual problem.
Germany is a/an/the/x European country.
She drinks a/an/the/x bottle of water everyday/every day.
Jack likes to play the/a/x basketball.
Bruce sailed over the/x water last weekend.

Write the following paragraphs, inserting a, an, and the where needed.

1. I have horse of my own. I call her Pretty Girl. She is intelligent animal, but she is not thoroughbred horse. I could never enter her in race, even if I wanted to. But I do not want to. She is companion, for my own pleasure. I took her swimming day or two ago.

2. Horse knows when he is going to race. How does he know? His breakfast was scanty. (He is angry about that.) He does not have saddle on his back. He is being led, not ridden, to grandstand. He is led under grandstand into unusual, special stall. Horse is nervous. Sometimes he does not know what to do when starting gate flies open and track is before him. If he does not begin to run instantly, other horses are already ahead of him. During race, when he sees another horse just ahead of him, he will try to pass him. Sometimes jockey holds him back to save his energy for last stretch. Eventually horse gets to run as fast as he can.

Exercise boy, watching owner's favorite jockey riding horse he has exercised day after day, says nothing. Secretly, he is planning for day when he will be jockey himself, and his horse will be first to cross finish line.

3. Most people have fewer hours to give to time-consuming activities of clubs than they used to have, but most people in small town belong to club or two. One of clubs is likely to be social and benevolent organization, such as Rotary or Elks. Business people are likely to belong, also to either Kiwanis Club or Lions. Such business people's organizations may meet as often as once a week in one of private dining rooms of town's leading hotel for lunch. They have good lunch, hear good program, and continue their fundraising program for worthy organization, such as local hospital.

4. Ahead on path was person, down hill four hundred yards away; but whether it was man or woman I could not tell. Some minutes later I saw her scarf and her skirt, and for more minutes on those long slopes we walked toward each other under big sky. We were only people visible in landscape – there was no one behind either of us. She was real walker – arms swinging, flat shoes, no dog, no map. It was lovely, too: blue sky above, sun in southeast, and cloudburst hanging like broken bag in west. I watched this woman, this fairly old woman, in her warm scarf and heavy coat, a bunch of flowers in her hand – I watched her come on, and thought I am not going to say hello until she does.
(Adapted from The Kingdom by the Sea, by Paul Theroux)

5. The rush of water and booming of mill bring dreamy deafness which seems to heighten peacefulness of scene. They are like great curtain of sound, shutting one out fromworld beyond. And now there is thunder of huge covered waggon coming home with sacks of grain. That honest waggoner is thinking of his dinner, getting sadly dry in oven at this late hour; but he will not touch it till he has fed his horses, - strong, submissive, meek-eyed beasts, who, I fancy, are looking mild reproach at him from between their blinkers, that he should crack his whip at them in that awful manner, as if they needed that hint! See how they stretch their shoulders, up slope towards bridge, with all more energy because they are so near home. Look at their grand shaggy feet that seem to grasp firm earth, at patient strength of their necks bowed under heavy collar, at mighty muscles of their struggling haunches! I should like well to hear them neigh over their hardly- earned feed of corn, and see them, with their moist necks freed from harness, dipping their eager nostrils into muddy pond. Now they are on bridge, and down they go again at swifter pace and arch of covered waggon disappears atturning behind trees.
(Adapted from Mill on the Floss, by George Eliot)