Noun: person, place, or thing (concrete)
Pronoun: Take place of noun (he, she, it)
Adjective: describes a noun
Verb: an action (remember “to be” and “to have” are actions)
Adverb: describes an action (often ends in ‘ly’)
Conjunction: links words or actions
Preposition: links nouns, pronouns, & phrases (to show relationships in time, shape, or logic)
Interjection: added to show emotion (!)
*Articles: a, and, the
The big black dog ran noisily through the neighborhood as it searched for its master.
Noun: dog
Adjective: big
Verb: ran
Adverb: noisily
Mr. Green’s big black dog ran noisily through the neighborhood as it searched for its master
Common: dog, master, neighborhood
Proper: Mr. Green
Pronoun: it, the dog
Adjective: black
Types of nouns
Common: names any one of a class of objects
Proper: names a particular person place, thing, or idea. Proper nouns always begin with a capital letter.
Collective: names a whole class or group of objects
Concrete: names something that can be perceived with at least one of the five senses
Abstract: names an idea or quality that cannot be perceived by the sense
Possessive: shows possession of the noun that follows singular nouns: ‘s plural nouns: s’ possessive of plural nouns that do not end in –s: ‘s
Examples
Concrete: apple
Abstract: freedom
Common: car
Proper: ford explorer
Collection: group
Nouns are replaced by pronouns (which must agree with their antecedent) and they are described by adjectives, which can be descriptive, limiting, or comparative
Make it plural:
Noun
Plural form
Examples
Most nouns
Add –s
King, kings, skate, skates
Nouns ending in a consonant and –y
Change the –y to –I and add –es
Pony, ponies, navy, navies
Nouns ending in –o
Add –es or –s
Potato, potatoes, piano, pianos
Most nouns ending in –f or –fe
Change the –f or –fe to ves
Leaf, leaves
Most nouns ending in –ch, -sh, -s, or –x
Add –es
Match, matches, rash, rashes, pass, passes
Many two-word or three-word compound nouns
Add –s to the principal word
Teaspoonfuls, governors generals
An adjective has three degrees of comparison: positive, comparative, and superlative.
Simple form is called the positive degree: Sinda is happy.
Comparative is comparing two people, groups, or things: Sinda is happier than Mariah
Superlative is used to compare three or more people or things: Sinda is the happiest person on the block.
Rules: for all adjectives of one syllable and a few adjectives with two syllables, add –er to form the comparative degree, and –est to form the superlative degree (highhigherhighest) for some adjectives of two syllables and all adjectives of three or more syllables, use more or less to form the comparative and most or least to form the superlative. (more/less painfulmost/least painful)
Sentence structure: every sentence has two main parts, a complete subject and a complete predicate.
The complete subject includes all the words that tell who or what the sentence is about, including a noun or pronoun. The corner store rents videos. This plastic moose wallet reminds me of home
The complete predicate includes all the words that state the action or condition of the subject, including a verb. The corner store rents videos. This plastic moose wallet reminds me of home.
Simple subject: main noun or pronoun in the complete subject. All other words in the complete subject modify or describe the simple subject.
Simple predicate: verb within the complete predicate. The simple predicate may be a one-word verb or a verb of more than one word.
Compound subject: made up of two or more simple subjects, usually joined together by ‘and’.
Compound predicate: made up of two or more simple predicates, usually joined together by ‘and’.
Phrases and clauses:
Phrase: group of closely related words that function together as a single element, such as subject,