Passive to active voice
Passive and active voices are terms that children may well not have come across before.
Generally, a sentence in the active voice has the subject coming before the verb. It performs the verb’s action.
For example: The mechanic changed the car wheel.
(The mechanic is the subject, carrying out the changing of the wheel.)
In the passive voice the subject receives the verb’s action and usually comes after the verb.
For example: The wheel was changed by the mechanic.
How to change voice from passive to active
If you can find the subject and the verb in a sentence then you can change the voice from passive to active or vice versa.
Let’s look at a sentence.
The glass was knocked over by Sam.
Now use these steps to change the sentence from passive to active.
Step 1: Find the action of the sentence (the verb)
What action is happening in the sentence? Someone (the subject) has knocked over something (the object). The action is the knocking over.
Step 2: Find the subject of the sentence.
The person doing the knocking over is Sam. In this case Sam is the subject and comes after the verb.
Step 3: Put the subject (Sam) before the verb.
Sam knocked over….
Sometimes you may need to alter the verb slightly to make sense. In this case remove ‘was’.
Step 4: Put the object where it belongs.
The glass receives the action and is the object of the sentence. Place it right after the verb.
Sam knocked over the glass.
Done!