In the following question, the sentence has a part given in brackets. Choose the alternative which best improves the bracketed part; if no improvement is required, select “no improvement”: What would you like (to do it) for your birthday?

Introduction / Context:
This sentence improvement question tests your understanding of correct infinitive usage in everyday English. The sentence is about plans for a birthday, and the part in brackets contains an extra pronoun that makes the phrase ungrammatical. You must choose the option that forms a natural and correct expression with “would you like”.

Given Data / Assumptions:

• Original sentence: “What would you like (to do it) for your birthday?”
• We must replace “to do it” with a grammatically correct and idiomatic alternative.
• Options: to do, doing, does, no improvement.
• Common patterns: “What would you like to do for your birthday?” is the standard question form.

Concept / Approach:
The verb like in such polite questions is usually followed by an infinitive without an extra object pronoun: would you like to do, would you like to eat, would you like to go. The pronoun it is unnecessary and incorrect here because the verb do already refers to the activity for the birthday. Therefore, “to do” alone is the right phrase. “Doing” changes the structure and sounds less natural in this polite question, and “does” is the wrong verb form. “No improvement” cannot be correct because “to do it” is not standard English in this context.

Step-by-Step Solution:
Identify the core structure: “What would you like … for your birthday?”Recall common usage: we normally ask “What would you like to do for your birthday?”Recognise that the extra pronoun “it” in “to do it” has no clear reference and makes the phrase clumsy.Compare with the options: “to do” matches the standard pattern “would you like to do + activity”.Eliminate “doing”, “does” and “no improvement” because they do not produce a natural, grammatically correct sentence.

Verification / Alternative check:
Read the corrected sentence: “What would you like to do for your birthday?” This sounds exactly like what a native speaker would ask when planning a celebration. If we keep “to do it”, we get “What would you like to do it for your birthday?”, which is clearly wrong. Replacing with “doing” gives “What would you like doing for your birthday?”, which is awkward and uncommon. “What would you like does” is grammatically impossible. Thus, “to do” is clearly the best improvement.

Why Other Options Are Wrong:
Doing is the -ing form that usually follows verbs like enjoy, avoid or consider, as in “What do you enjoy doing?”, but with “would you like”, the infinitive is more natural and polite. Does is the present tense form of do for he/she/it, which does not fit here at all. “No improvement” would leave the incorrect phrase “to do it” in place, which exam grammar rules do not accept in this structure.

Common Pitfalls:
Students sometimes carry over the pronoun it from other sentences like “I will do it tomorrow” and mistakenly add it in places where the activity itself is already understood from context. With general questions about preferences, such as “What would you like to do?”, we do not add it unless we refer to a specific thing already mentioned. Remember that in polite questions with would you like, the simple infinitive to do is almost always correct when asking about activities.

Final Answer:
The correct improvement is to do, so the sentence should read: “What would you like to do for your birthday?”