Grammar Fix: I am agree: the verb that isn't an adjective

Objective & content

students recognise that agree (and disagree) is a plain verb, exactly like like or want, and never put am/is/are in front of it — "I agree", not "I am agree" — across pronoun, name and noun subjects and in the negative. The printable is the unit's class pack: one A4 pupil sheet (recognition items, then fill-in and word-order drills) printed once per pupil, and one teacher sheet with the answer key and the notes below.

Pedagogical guide

this one is romance-market specific, not universal. French, Spanish and Italian all express agreement with their own "be + agreement word" phrase as the dominant, near-exclusive way to say it (être d'accord, estar de acuerdo, essere d'accordo), so the calque maps be to am and the agreement word to agree. Portuguese has the same be-shaped option (estar de acordo) but an equally standard plain verb (concordar), so the transfer is real but weaker and less consistent. Polish students are not expected to make this mistake at all: zgadzać się is a reflexive verb with no "be" involved, so there is nothing to transfer from. Treat this as a slip to watch for in French, Spanish, Italian and (to a lesser extent) Portuguese speakers, not as something every learner in the room will do. Use it after the class has watched the unit, or on its own as a targeted repair when the mistake shows up in written work.

Suggested procedure

1. (3 min) Write the target sentence on the board and ask what is wrong with it. Collect the class's answers.
2. (10 min) Pupils work through the pupil sheet alone: recognition items first, then the drills.
3. (5 min) Check with the teacher sheet. Read the explanation of each recognition item aloud.
4. (2 min) Exit line: each pupil writes one correct sentence with the structure on a slip of paper.

Adaptations

• [S] Do the recognition items together as a class before pupils try the drills alone.
• [A] in pairs, students state an opinion ("Pizza is the best food.") and their partner responds with "I agree" or "I disagree", then a third sentence using a real adjective ("I am hungry!") to check they haven't overcorrected.

Materials & prerequisites

One pupil sheet per pupil, one teacher sheet. No audio needed; the Grammar Fix unit video is an optional lead-in. Watch for: dropping the -s on agrees after he/she/it/a name while also removing "be" (this sheet's items test the plain-verb form across I/she/they/he/we/a name/a negative); overcorrection once the rule lands — students who have just learned "agree never takes be" sometimes start dropping "be" everywhere, including in front of real adjectives ("I happy" instead of "I am happy"); a third of this sheet's items are built specifically to catch that swing, so don't be surprised if a student who "gets" agree still drops "be" from tired, ready or sure; disagree follows the identical rule and is tested the same way, not as a separate lesson.

Curriculum alignment

Grammar tags: be-affirmative. Filed at A2- (the level where the mistake starts to appear); the example sentences stay inside that band.

Assessment & extensions

The exit line is the check. Extend with the Grammar Fix unit itself, or with the grammar sheet on the same structure when one exists.