For thousands of years, people in the Americas ________ the bottle gourd, a large bitter fruit with a thick rind,...

Let's begin by understanding the meaning of this sentence. We'll use our understanding of pause points and segment the sentence as shown - understanding and assimilating the meaning of each segment bit by bit!

Sentence Structure

First sentence:

• For thousands of years,
• people in the Americas
  • [?] the bottle gourd,
    • a large bitter fruit with a thick rind,
  • to make bottles, other types of containers, and even musical instruments.

Second sentence:

• Oddly,
• there is no evidence
  • that any type of bottle gourd is native to the Western Hemisphere;
• either the fruit or its seeds
  • must have somehow been carried from Asia or Africa.

Understanding the Meaning

Let's start reading from the beginning:

The sentence begins with a time frame:

• 'For thousands of years'
  • This tells us we're talking about something that has been happening over a very long time period – from the ancient past up until now.

Then we get the subject:

• 'people in the Americas'
  • This is who has been doing something for thousands of years.

This is where we have the blank. Let's look at the choices:

1. to use
2. have used
3. having used
4. using

To see what works here, let's read the rest of the sentence and understand what it's saying!

The sentence continues:

• '______ the bottle gourd, a large bitter fruit with a thick rind, to make bottles, other types of containers, and even musical instruments.'

So the complete meaning is:

• For thousands of years, people in the Americas have been doing something with the bottle gourd
• What is a bottle gourd? A large bitter fruit with a thick rind
• Why have they been using it? To make bottles, containers, and musical instruments

The second sentence adds more context:

• 'Oddly, there is no evidence that any type of bottle gourd is native to the Western Hemisphere'
  • This is surprising information – the gourd isn't originally from the Americas
• 'either the fruit or its seeds must have somehow been carried from Asia or Africa'
  • So it must have traveled from the Old World to the Americas somehow

What do we notice about the structure here?

The key phrase is 'For thousands of years' at the beginning:

• This time expression tells us about an action that started in the ancient past and continues to have relevance to the present
  • When we talk about something that has been happening from the past up to now, we need a specific verb form that shows this connection
• We need a complete verb – one that can work as the main action of the sentence
  • The blank must contain the main verb telling us what people have been doing

So we need: have used

This verb form:

• Works with the plural subject 'people' (people HAVE used, not people HAS used)
• Shows the connection between past and present that 'for thousands of years' requires
• Serves as the complete main verb of the sentence

GRAMMAR CONCEPT APPLIED

Using Verb Forms That Connect Past to Present

When you have a time expression that indicates a duration from the past continuing to the present (like "for thousands of years," "for decades," "since 1990"), you need a verb form that shows this connection – specifically, the form that uses "have" or "has" plus the past participle (called the present perfect tense in grammar terms):

Pattern: [Subject] + have/has + [past participle] + [rest of sentence]

Example 1:

• Time expression: "For ten years"
• Subject: "scientists" (plural)
• Correct form: "For ten years, scientists have studied this phenomenon."
• Why: The studying started in the past and continues to the present

Example 2:

• Time expression: "Since the 1800s"
• Subject: "the company" (singular)
• Correct form: "Since the 1800s, the company has produced high-quality instruments."
• Why: The production started in the past and continues to the present

In this question:

• Time expression: "For thousands of years"
• Subject: "people in the Americas" (plural)
• Correct form: "For thousands of years, people in the Americas have used the bottle gourd..."
• Why: The usage started thousands of years ago and has continued (or at least has relevance) to the present

Key point: The sentence also needs a complete verb form (finite verb) to be grammatically complete. Forms like "to use," "using," and "having used" cannot function as the main verb on their own – they would create sentence fragments.