Re-write the following sentences according to the instructions given after each. Make other changes that may be necessary, but do not change the meaning of each sentence.
I would rather eat fruit than a lot of unhealthy junk food. (Begin: I prefer....)
Topic: Transformation — 'prefer'
Answer
I prefer eating fruit to eating a lot of unhealthy junk food.
The two constructions take different connecting words AND different verb forms: would rather + BARE INFINITIVE + THAN (would rather EAT... than) prefer + GERUND + TO (prefer EATING... to EATING)
Both parts must change, and the second is the one candidates forget. Writing "I prefer eating fruit THAN junk food" keeps the wrong connector; writing "I prefer to eat fruit to eat junk food" keeps the wrong verb form.
Note also that the two things compared must be in the SAME grammatical form — eating and eating, or fruit and junk food. Mixing them ("prefer fruit to eating junk food") is a parallelism error.
This transformation appears in the 2021, 2024 and 2025 papers as well. Learn it in both directions.