grammar - "Which exams is he taking?" or "Which exams are he taking?"

There is a set of exams (e.g. SAT subject tests, AP exams, etc.), and a (male) student is necessarily taking more than one of those exams. My friend knows which ones he's taking, so I'm asking him which ones. Which sentence is correct?

"Which exams is he taking?"

or

"Which exams are he taking?"

Both sound weird to me, especially the second (even though I believe that is technically the correct one).

I would appreciate if somebody could help tag this question properly.

Answer

In order to decide which of the two sentences is correct, you need to understand the syntax:

• the subject is he,


• the object is which exams,


• the main verb is take combined with the auxiliary be.

The number of the verb depends on the number of the subject. Since the subject is singular ("he"), the verb is also singular.

So one may say, "He is taking exams in two subjects this year." And the correct form of the question would be, "Which exams is he taking?"