B1+Modals and related verbs

Do or make

Develop accuracy with less basic do/make collocations and distinguish activity/work from creation, result or effect.

Overview

What this grammar does

Develop accuracy with less basic do/make collocations and distinguish activity/work from creation, result or effect.

Form and rules

How it works

Do often combines with work, tasks, research, business and general activities: do research, do business.

Make often combines with plans, decisions, arrangements, progress, changes and effects: make progress, make a difference.

Many collocations cannot be predicted reliably, so learn them as chunks.

Do can replace an obvious activity in general expressions: do something, do nothing, do your best.

Make can mean cause a result: The news made me happy; this pattern is make + object + adjective/base verb.

A closer look

Meaning and use

Do can replace an obvious activity in general expressions: do something, do nothing, do your best.

Make can mean cause a result: The news made me happy; this pattern is make + object + adjective/base verb.

Examples

See the pattern in complete sentences

We need to do more research.

She made significant progress.

Let's make arrangements for Friday.

That change made a big difference.

The joke made everyone laugh.

Common mistakes

What to avoid

The team needs to make more research before deciding.

The team needs to do more research before deciding.

The fixed collocation is do research.

She's doing excellent progress with her English.

She's making excellent progress with her English.

The fixed collocation is make progress.

Ready to practise?

The test combines multiple choice, gap completion, error correction, and sentence building so students have to recognise and produce the grammar, not simply reread the rule.

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