An ELT Glossary D Flashcards
Dangling participles
a participle (= “-ing” or “-ed” form of a verb) intended to modify (= refer to or describe) a noun that is not in the text, so it seems to modify another noun:
Example: In the sentence “Arriving home, the door was open”, the dangling participle makes it sound as though the door has arrived home.
Declarative Sentence
a sentence that makes a statement or states a factFor
For example:
I live in London
Deductive approach
An approach to teaching language which starts with the presentation of rules and then illustrates those rules with examples. Learners are then asked to apply the rules in practice activities
Example : Learners would be told : The regular form of simple past is made by adding -ed to the infinitive verb. Eg : play-played; walk-walked; ask-asked. They would then (eg) be given a list of present simple sentences containing regular verbs and the phrase “every day” and asked to write them changing “every day” to “yesterday”.
The Grammar-Translation Method, which was introduced in the late 19th century, used a deductive approach.
Defective verbs
Definition
A verb which does not have a full range of the normal forms.
Examples
used to does not have infinitive, present simple or present participle forms. It is only used in the past simple and (though rarely) past perfect.
Beware is only used in the imperative and infinitive (Beware of the dog/ Let the buyer beware). It has no tense or aspect. You can’t say eg * He never bewares of the dog. The same is true of mind, with the same meaning of beware. Imperative (Mind you don’t drop it!) and infinitive (The notice says to mind the gap) forms exist but no finite or participle forms - you can’t say eg *I minded the gap. / *Don’t worry - I’m minding not to drop it.
all modal verbs lack infinitive, 3rd person singular present simple and participle forms.
The definite article
Is the article “the”. It introduces information which is shared between the writer/reader or speaker/listener.
