Nowadays, tug-of-war is usually seen as an informal game one might play at a picnic or in gym class. Surprisingly,...

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

Sentence Structure

Sentence 1:

• Nowadays,
• tug-of-war is usually seen as an informal game one might play at a picnic or in gym class.

Sentence 2:

• Surprisingly,
• the Olympic committee once decided [?] tug-of-war as an official Olympic event!
  • Where [?] = included/including/include/to include

Sentence 3:

• Nations competed in the event at the Olympic Games from 1900 to 1920.

Understanding the Meaning

Let's start from the beginning.

Sentence 1 sets the context:

• "Nowadays, tug-of-war is usually seen as an informal game one might play at a picnic or in gym class."
  • Today, we think of tug-of-war as just a casual game.

Sentence 2 introduces a surprise:

• "Surprisingly, the Olympic committee once decided ______ tug-of-war as an official Olympic event!"

Now here's where we need to fill in the blank.

Let's look at our choices:

1. included
2. including
3. include
4. to include

What do we notice about the structure here?

• "Decided" is the main verb telling us what the Olympic committee did.
• We need to figure out what verb form works after "decided."

Think about how we naturally use the word "decide" in English:

• We say "I decided to go" - not "I decided going" or "I decided go"
• We say "They decided to eat" - not "They decided eating" or "They decided eat"
• The pattern is: decide + to + verb

So we need: "decided to include"

The correct answer is D. to include.

Now let's read Sentence 3 to complete the picture:

• "Nations competed in the event at the Olympic Games from 1900 to 1920."
  • This tells us when this actually happened - for about 20 years, countries actually competed in Olympic tug-of-war!

GRAMMAR CONCEPT APPLIED

Verbs That Require Infinitives (to + verb)

Certain verbs in English are followed by the infinitive form - that means "to" plus the base form of a verb. "Decide" is one of these verbs.

The pattern:

• Subject + decide + to + verb + rest of sentence

Examples:

• The committee decided to include the sport
  • "decided" = main verb
  • "to include" = infinitive showing what they decided
• She decided to compete in the Olympics
  • "decided" = main verb
  • "to compete" = infinitive showing what she decided
• We decided to watch the games on TV
  • "decided" = main verb
  • "to watch" = infinitive showing what we decided

Other common verbs that follow this pattern:

• want to, hope to, plan to, choose to, agree to, refuse to, promise to

In this question:

• "The Olympic committee once decided to include tug-of-war..."
  • "decided" is the main verb
  • "to include" is the infinitive that completes the meaning of what they decided

This is an idiomatic pattern in English - you learn which verbs take infinitives through practice and familiarity with the language!