Phrases and Clauses

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Phrases and Clauses

• By Lauren, Sarah, Dan and Tim

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Phrases

• A phrase is a group of related words that does
  not include a subject or a verb, or both. A
  phrase cannot stand alone as a sentence.
• E.g.
• On this bright and sunny Monday morning, we are
  going to tell you about Phrases and Clauses.

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Phrases

• There are lots of different kinds of phrases,
  including
• Prepositional phrases these usually tell us
  when or where something is happening, e.g.
• From the front of the class, Dan will now tell
  you about Noun Phrases.

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Phrases

• Noun phrases these include nouns and any words
  that modify the nouns, e.g.
• And now, tall, talkative Tim will talk about
  Adjectival phrases.

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Phrases

• Adjectival phrases consists of a group of words
  that do the job of an adjective in modifying a
  noun, e.g.
• Students, with good memories, will remember our
  entertaining presentation for years to come!

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Phrases

• Adverbial phrases these usually provide answers
  to questions such as when, where, how, why and
  for how long, e.g.
• We will do our presentation in the first ten
  minutes of the lesson, then Liz will tell us
  about Handwriting.

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Clauses

• A clause is a group of related words that contain
  both a subject and a verb/predicate.
• Clauses may be able to stand alone as a sentence,
  e.g.
• Nobody really wants to listen to our
  presentation, but were making you anyway!

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Clauses

• There are two different types of clauses
• Main/Independent clause these can stand by
  themselves as discrete sentences, e.g.
• Liz asked us to do a presentation on clauses,
  but we included phrases too!

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Clauses

• Subordinate/Dependent clause these cannot stand
  by themselves. They must be combined with an
  independent clause in order to make sense. E.g.
• We want you to listen to this presentation,
  because we think it will be useful to you.

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Dependant Clauses

• There are three basic kinds of dependent clauses,
  categorised according to their function in a
  sentence
• Adverbial clauses provides further information
  about what is going on in the main clause such as
  where, when and why
• Adjectival clauses work like multi-word
  adjectives
• Noun clauses they can do anything that nouns
  can do

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Misplacing Phrases and Clauses

• If you accidentally misplace a phrase or a clause
  in a sentence so they dont agree with the
  subject, sometimes funny or even embarrassing
  meanings and images will result, e.g.
• Ladies, dont forget the rummage sale. Its a
  chance to get rid of those things not worth
  keeping around the house. Bring your husbands.

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Phrase or Clause?

• Now see if you can figure out whether these
  fragments of sentences are phrases or clauses
• http//www.btinternet.com/mrfield/Literacy_Disk/p
  hrase_clauses/phrase_clauses.htm

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Bibliography

• Medwell, J., Moore, G., Wray, D. and Griffiths,
  V. (2002) Primary English Knowledge and
  Understanding, Exeter Learning Matters Ltd.
• McDowell, M. Phrases and Clauses,
  http//marksesl.com/grammar/Phrases_and_Clauses.ht
  m (Date accessed 18.04.08)
• Phrases and Clauses Quiz, http//www.btinternet.co
  m/mrfield/Literacy_Disk/phrase_clauses/phrase_cla
  uses.htm (Date accessed 18.04.08)
• The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation (2008)
  Dangling Phrases and Clauses, http//data.grammarb
  ook.com/blog/?p79 (Date accessed 18.04.08)
• Yates, I. (1994) How to be brilliant at Grammar,
  Leamington Spa Brilliant Publications