MODAL VERBS

Asking for/Giving Permission

• How would you tell your friend in a text that he/she is able to borrow your car?

• How would you ask a professor via email to excuse you from the next day’s class?

(Think of as many different ways as you can.)

Degrees of Certainty

• List some cause and effect essay topics: real causal relationships? Or possible? Write the corresponding thesis statements.

• Write an ad for one of the inventions we saw earlier in class.

• Write a weather report.

• Write a letter to an employee who has not been performing well on the job.

Suggestions/Advice

• Imagine that someone wrote to the advice column

of a newspaper with this problem:

• “I want my husband to take me out more often, but he says we

can’t afford to spend money on things like theaters and

restaurants. How can we spend quality time together without

doing the same boring things at home over and over again?”

Write a response to this person, which will be

published in the paper.

Necessity

• Write a set of rules for employees working in a restaurant.

• How would you respond to an email from your boss regarding a mandatory meeting that you will absolutely not be able to attend?

Ability

• Write a brief narrative about a famous person

(leader, actor or athlete) who is now much older

or deceased. What were they famous for? What

abilities did they have in the past? If they are still

living, do they have any of those abilities now?