Page 11 - Basic English Usage

11 Words used in the explanations

main clause Some sentences have a main clause and one or more
subordinate clauses. Example: When | got home | asked Mary what
she thought. The main clause is / asked Mary, the other two clauses
are like parts of the main clause (the first is like an adverb, the other is
like an object): they are subordinate clauses.
modal auxiliary verbs can, could, may, might, must, will, shall, would,
should, ought and need.
noun aword like oil, memory, thing, which can be used with an article.
Nouns are usually the names of people or things.
object See direct object and subject.
omission, omit leaving out words. In the sentence / know (that) you
don't like her, we can omit that.
participle When we use the -ing form like an adjective or verb, we call it
a present participle. Examples: a crying child, | was working. Forms
like broken, gone, heard, stopped are past participles. See 234.
passive see active.
past participle see participle.
perfect a verb form made with have. Examples: / have seen, They had
forgotten; She will have arrived.
phrasal verb verb + adverb particle. Examples: stand up, write down.
phrase a group of words that are used together. Our old house is a
noun phrase; has been so/d is a verb phrase.
plural a form used for more than one. Books, they, many are plural;
book, she, much are singular.
preposition a word like on, through, over, in, by, for.
present participle see participle.
possessive a form like my, mine, John's, used to show possession.
progressive / am going, | was going are progressive verb forms; / go,
! went are simple verb forms.
pronoun We use a pronoun instead of a more precise noun phrase.
Examples: /, it, yourself, their, one.
proper noun, proper name a noun that is the name of a person, place
etc. Examples: Peter, Einstein, Birmingham.
question tag a small question at the end of a sentence. Examples:
don’t you? wasn't it?
regular a regular form follows the same rules as most others. An
irregular form does not. Stopped is a regular past tense; wentis
irregular. Books is a regular plural; women is irregular.
relative pronouns, relative clauses see 277~280.
reported speech see direct speech.
second person you, yourselves, your are second person forms.
sentence a complete ‘piece of language’. In writing, a sentence
begins with a capital (big) letter and ends with a full stop (.). A sen-
tence is usually made of one or more clauses.
simple see progressive.
singular see plural.