Basic Grammar Labels for Sentence Structure

Question 1

subject

Answer 1

person or thing that does the action of the verb

Question 2

predicate

Answer 2

everything (including the verb) besides the subject

Question 3

simple subject

Answer 3

the main noun or pronoun

Question 4

complete subject

Answer 4

simple subject + all modifiers

Question 5

simple predicate

Answer 5

just the verb or verb phrase

Question 6

complete predicate

Answer 6

verb + all modifiers

Question 7

“The brown foxes jumped quickly.” Identify the simple subject.

Answer 7

foxes

Question 8

“The brown foxes jumped quickly.” Identify the complete subject.

Answer 8

the brown foxes

Question 9

“The brown foxes jumped quickly.” Identify the simple predicate.

Answer 9

jumped

Question 10

“The brown foxes jumped quickly.” Identify the complete predicate.

Answer 10

jumped quickly

Question 11

“The brown foxes jumped quickly over the lazy dog.” Identify the simple subject.

Answer 11

foxes

Question 12

“The brown foxes jumped quickly over the lazy dog.” Identify the complete subject.

Answer 12

the brown foxes

Question 13

“The brown foxes jumped quickly over the lazy dog.” Identify the simple predicate.

Answer 13

jumped

Question 14

“The brown foxes jumped quickly over the lazy dog.” Identify the complete predicate.

Answer 14

jumped quickly over the lazy dog

Question 15

Identify what kind of ESL error is made in these sentences:
“I like tennis very much. Is my favorite sport.”
“The police arrested the man. The police did this because robbed a store.”

Answer 15

leaving out the subject entirely, esp. when the subject is a pronoun

Question 16

Identify what kind of ESL error is made in these sentences:
“I am not sure where is Calcutta.”
“Cairo is more popular than thinks Joe.”

Answer 16

inverting the subject and verb (putting the verb before the subject)

Question 17

Identify the different parts of these sentences:
“The children played a game.”
“The children played it.”

Answer 17

The children + played + game –> subject + verb + object (noun)
The children + played + it –> subject + verb + object (pronoun)

Question 18

direct object

Answer 18

an object that is a receiver of the action

Question 19

indirect object

Answer 19

the person (or thing) to whom or for whom the action was done

Question 20

“John read a story.” What did John read? Direct or indirect object?

Answer 20

a story = direct object

Question 21

“John read the children a story.” For whom or to whom did John read a story? Direct or indirect object?

Answer 21

the children = indirect object

Question 22

transitive verb

Answer 22

verbs that need to have an object

ex. bring, climb, contain, discuss, etc.

Question 23

Identify what kind of ESL error is made in these sentences.
“Tennis is my favorite sport. I like very much.”
“The police arrested the man because he robbed.”

Answer 23

These are transitive verbs that are missing the direct object.

Question 24

Identify what kind of ESL error is made in these sentences.
“In the meeting, we discussed about her ideas.”
“Many people enjoyed of her innovative ideas.”

Answer 24

Unnecessary prepositions are inserted with the transitive verbs.

Question 25

intransitive verbs

Answer 25

verbs that can never be followed by an object in English (they might be followed by an adverb, a prepositional phrase, or nothing at all)
(ex. complain, consist, die, emerge, happen, etc.)

Question 26

Identify what kind of ESL error is made in these sentences.
“Water consists hydrogen and oxygen.”
“At the finish line, the winner emerged the runners.”

Answer 26

They are treating the intransitive verb as if it were a transitive verb (by leaving out the required preposition - in this case, “of” and “from”)

Question 27

Identify what kind of ESL error is made in these sentences.
“In the meeting, we complained for the new rules.”
“What happened with your car?”

Answer 27

They inserted the incorrect prepositions.

Question 28

Give some examples of verbs that can be both transitive and intransitive.

Answer 28

begin, change, drink, eat, end, finish, guess, leave, move, open, run, speak, start, study

Question 29

phrase

Answer 29

a group of words that does not contain both a subject and a verb, acts as one part of speech

Question 30

What are the three most common types of phrases?

Answer 30

noun phrases, verb phrases, prepositional phrases

Question 31

What are the phrases in this sentence?

“The red grammar book is lying on the coffee table.”

Answer 31

the red grammar book (noun phrase)
is lying on the coffee table (verb phrase)
on the coffee table (prepositional phrase)
the coffee table (noun phrase)

Question 32

clause

Answer 32

clause is a group of words with both subject and verb

Question 33

independent clause

Answer 33

has a subject and a verb and expresses a complete thought and therefore can stand on its own

Question 34

dependent clause

Answer 34

has a subject and a verb but does not express a complete thought and cannot stand on its own

Question 35

What are the independent and dependent clauses of this sentence?
“I want to give you the book that I bought at a garage sale yesterday.”

Answer 35

independent: I want to give you the book
dependent: that I bought at a garage sale yesterday

Question 36

What are the three types of dependent clauses?

Answer 36

adverb clauses, adjective clauses, and noun clauses

Question 37

adverb clauses

Answer 37

• answer questions such as when, where, why, with what result, and under which conditions
• modify the verb
• begin with subordinating conjunctions

Question 38

subordinating conjunctions

Answer 38

what adverb clauses start with (ex. after, although, as soon as, because. etc.)

Question 39

When can adverb clauses occur?

Answer 39

before or after the main clause –> if it comes before the main clause, the adverb clause is followed by a comma

Question 40

Identify the independent clause and adverb clause in this sentence.
“They stopped the game because the rain started.

Answer 40

They stopped the game (independent clause) because the rain started (adverb clause).

Question 41

adjective clause

Answer 41

• a dependent clauses that specifies which one
• modifies nouns or pronouns
• begin with one of the five relative pronouns (who, whom, whose, that, and which) or one of two subordinating conjunctions (when and where)

Question 42

noun clauses

Answer 42

• answer questions such as who, whom, or what

- some words that commonly introduce noun clauses are that, what, who, why, when, where, and whether

Question 43

What are the four kinds of sentences?

Answer 43

simple sentences, compound sentences, complex sentences, and compound-complex sentences

Question 44

simple sentence

Answer 44

has one independent clause (can have multiple subjects and multiple verbs but there is only one subject-verb relationship)

Question 45

compound sentence

Answer 45

contains two independent clauses (or two simple sentences) that are combined by one of seven coordinating conjunctions

Question 46

What are the seven coordinating conjunctions?

Answer 46

FANBOYS: for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so

Question 47

complex sentence

Answer 47

has one independent clause and at least one dependent clause

Question 48

compound-complex sentence

Answer 48

contains two independent clauses and at least one dependent clause

Question 49

subject-verb agreement

Answer 49

a singular subject needs a singular verb and a plural subject needs a plural verb

Question 50

What are the three common errors in incorrect sentence composition?

Answer 50

run-on sentences, comma splices, and fragments

Question 51

run-on sentence

Answer 51

has two parts that the writer has pushed together without a proper conjunction or punctuation –> can also be called fused sentences

Question 52

comma splice

Answer 52

sentence has two parts but the writer has put a comma in between them without any connector word

Question 53

fragment

Answer 53

• incomplete sentence

- frequently a phrase or dependent clause that is not properly connected to the main clause