Problem Vocabulary and Prepositions

PREPOSITION

Definition: Prepositions are a class of words that indicate relationships between nouns, pronouns and other words in a sentence. Most often they come before a noun. They never change their form, regardless of the case, gender etc. of the word they are referring to.

Some common prepositions are:

about
above
across
after
against
along
among
around
at
before
behind
below
beneath
beside
between
beyond
but
by
despite
down
during
except
for
from
in
inside
into
like
near
of
off
on
onto
out
outside
over
past
since
through
throughout
till
to
toward
under
underneath
until
up
upon
with
within
without.

Prepositions typically come before a noun:

For example:

* after class
* at home
* before Tuesday
* in London
* on fire
* with pleasure

A preposition usually indicates the temporal, spatial or logical relationship of its object to the rest of the sentence.

For example:

* The book is on the table.
* The book is beside the table.
* She read the book during class.


In each of the preceding sentences, a preposition locates the noun "book" in space or in time.

Prepositions are classified as simple or compound.

Simple prepositions
Simple prepositions are single word prepositions. These are all showed above.

For example:

* The book is on the table.

Compound prepositions
Compound prepositions are more than one word. in between and because of are prepositions made up of two words - in front of, on behalf of are prepositions made up of three words.

For example:

* The book is in between War and Peace and The Lord of the Rings.
* The book is in front of the clock.

Examples:

* The children climbed the mountain without fear.
* There was rejoicing throughout the land when the government was defeated.
* The spider crawled slowly along the banister.

Subject, Verb, Complement & Modifier

SUBJECT

Definition: The subject of a sentence is the noun, pronoun or noun phrase that precedes and governs the main verb. The subject is the part of the sentence that performs an action or which is associated with the action.

For example:

* He is a really nice guy.
* "He" is the subject of the sentence, controlling the verb and the complement.
* My dog attacked the burglar.
* "My dog" is the subject, controlling the verb and the rest of the sentence.
* David plays the piano
* The subject "David" performs the action of "playing the piano".
* The police interviewed all the witnesses.
* The subject the police performs the action of interviewing all the witnesses.

To determine the subject of a sentence, first isolate the verb and then make a question by placing "who?" or "what?" before it. Having identified the Subject, we can see that the remainder of the sentence tells us what the Subject does or did. We refer to this string as the "predicate" of the sentence.

For example:

* Who plays the piano?
=> "David" ( = Subject)
=> "plays the piano" ( = predicate) tells us what David does.
* Who interviewed all the witnesses?
=> "The police" (= Subject)
=> "interviewed all the witnesses" ( = predicate) tell us what the police did.

Subjects can either be "simple", "compound" or "complex"

Simple Subject
Composed of a single pronoun, noun or noun phrase.

Complex Subject
A complex subject consists of a noun phrase and any words, phrases, or clauses that modify it.

For example:

* The man who had followed us inside walked over to the telephone.
=> central noun: man
=> complex subject: the man who had followed us inside
* The superior performance of La Traviata pleased the wealthy audience.
=> central noun: performance
=> complex subject: the superior performance of La Traviata

Compound Subject
A compound subject consists of two or more noun phrases (and their modifiers if any) joined together with a coordinating conjunction.

For example:

* The man and the woman walked over to the telephone.
=> The compound subject here is the whole phrase, "the man and the woman."
* Neither the superior performance of La Traviata nor the excellent wine at intermission pleased the wealthy audience.
=> Again, the whole phrase, "neither the superior performance of La Traviata nor the excellent wine at intermission," is the subject. The phrase answers the question, "What pleased the wealthy audience?"

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VERBS

Definition: Verbs are a class of words used to show the performance of an action (do, throw, run), existence (be), possession (have), or state (know, love) of a subject. To put it simply a verb shows what something or someone does.

For example:

* Paul rides a bicycle.
* Here, the verb rides certainly denotes an action which Paul performs - the action of riding a bicycle.
* We buy some books to learn English verbs.
* In this example, the action word is "to buy". It tells us that the subject "we", that is the person who performs the action of the verb is "buying some books".

The verb tense shows the time of the action or state. Aspect shows whether the action or state is completed or not. Voice is used to show relationships between the action and the people affected by it. Mood shows the attitude of the speaker about the verb, whether it is a declaration or an order. Verbs can be affected by person and number to show agreement with the subject.

Most statements in speech and writing have a main verb. These verbs are expressed in "tenses" which place everything in a point in time.

Verbs are conjugated (inflected) to reflect how they are used. There are two general areas in which conjugation occurs; for person and for tense.

Conjugation for tense
Conjugation for tense is carried out on all verbs. All conjugations start with the infinitive form of the verb.
The infinitive is simply the to form of the verb For example, to begin.
The present participle form (the -ing form), is formed by adding ing to the bare infinitive. For example, to begin - beginning.
There are two other forms that the verb can take, depending on the tense type and time, the simple past form and the past participle.

The form of the verb or its tense can tell when events take place.
For example, the verb kiss:

Present Simple: kiss/kisses
Past Simple: kissed
Future Simple: will kiss
Present Perfect: has/have kissed
Past Perfect: had kissed
Future Perfect: will have kissed
Present Continuous (Progressive): is/am/are kissing
Past Continuous (Progressive): was kissing
Future Continuous (Progressive): will be kissing
Present Perfect Continuous (Progressive): has/have been kissing
Past Perfect Continuous (Progressive): had been kissing
Future Perfect Continuous (Progressive): will have been kissing

Conjugation for person
Conjugation for person occurs when the verb changes form, depending on whether it is governed by a first, second, or third person subject. This gives three conjugations for any verb depending on who is acting as the subject of the verb. For example: we have I begin, you begin , and he begins. Note that only the third conjunction really shows a difference.

In English, we distinguish between regular and irregular verbs. Regular verbs are those ones which form their past simple and past participle just by adding "-ed" to the base of the verb. The rest are irregular.

Examples:

* Dracula bites his victims on the neck.
* In early October, Giselle will plant twenty tulip bulbs.
* She travels to work by train.
* We walked five miles to a garage.

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The Grammatical Subject Complement in English

Although nouns and adjectives most frequently function as the subject complement of sentences, five grammatical forms can perform the grammatical function of subject complement in the English language. Both native speakers and ESL students must learn and understand the five forms that can function as the subject complement in order to speak and write English fully and correctly. The five grammatical forms that can function as the subject complement are:

1. Noun phrases
2. Adjective phrases
3. Prepositional phrases
4. Verb phrases
5. Noun clauses

Subject complements are defined as words, phrases, and clauses that follow a copular or linking verb and refer back to modify or describe the subject. Subject complements are grammatical constituents embedded in the predicate of clauses.
Noun Phrases as Subject Complements

The first grammatical form that can perform the grammatical function of subject complement is the noun phrase. Noun phrases are defined as phrases that consist of a noun or pronoun plus any modifiers or complements. For example, the following italicized noun phrases function as subject complements:

* My favorite subject is grammar.
* The professor is an exceptionally intelligent person.
* My sister became a mother last night.

Traditional grammars generally use the term predicate nominative to refer to noun phrases functioning as subject complements.
Adjective Phrases as Subject Complements

The second grammatical form that can perform the grammatical function of subject complement is the adjective phrase. Adjective phrases are defined as phrases that consist of an adjective plus any modifiers or complements.

Pronoun

Definition: A pronoun usually refers to something already mentioned in a sentence or piece of text. A pronoun is a word that substitutes a noun or noun phrase used to prevent repetition of the noun to which they refer. One of the most common pronouns is it.

Rule for Pronouns
A pronoun must agree with the noun it refer. Therefore, if the noun is singular, therefore the pronoun must be singular; if the noun is plural, use a plural pronoun; if the noun is feminine, use a feminine pronoun, and so on.

For example:

* The train was late, it had been delayed.
* The trains were late, they had been delayed.

Types of pronouns
English Pronouns are divided into sub-categories. These are Demonstrative, Personal, Reflexive, Possessive, Interrogative, Negative, Reciprocal, Relative and Quantifier

Verb 2

Verb 1

Simple Present & Present Progressive
Example:
1. Something smells very good.
2. We are eating dinner at seven o'clock tonight.
3. He is practices the piano everyday.
4. They are driving to school tomorrow.
5. I believe you.
6. Maria has a cold.
7. Jorge is swimming right now.
8. John hates smoke.
9. Jill always gets up at 6.00AM.
10. Jerry is mowing the lawn now.

Simple Past Tense & PastProgressive
Example:
1. Genre was eating dinner when his friend called.
2. While Maria was cleaning the apartment, her husband was sleeping.
3. At three o'clock this morning, Eleanor was study.
4. When Mark arrived, the Johnsons were having dinner, but they stopped in order to talk to him.
5. John went to France last year.
6. When the teacher entered the room, the students were talking.
7. While Joan was writing the report, Henry was looking for more information.
8. We saw this movie last night.
9. At one time, Mr. Robeds was own this building.
10. Jose was writing a letter to his family when his pencil broke.

"Other" Function

Using other with:
a) Count nouns
- an + other + singular noun(one more)
another pencil -- one more pencil
- the + other + singular noun(last of the set)
the other pencil -- the last pencil present
- other + plural noun(more of the set)
other pencil -- some more pencils
- the other + plural noun(the rest of the set)
the other pencils -- all remaining pencils
b) Non-count nouns
- other + plural noun(more of the set)
other water -- some more water
- the other + plural noun(the rest of the set)
the other water -- all remaining water

Excercise :
1. this pen isn't working please gave me another (singular)
2. if you'r still, i'll make the other pot of coffee
3. this dictionary hase a page missing. please give me the other one (the last one)
4. he doesn't need those books the needs the other (all the remaining)
5. there are thirty people in the room, twenty are from latin america and the other are from other countries
6. six people where in the store two buying meat the other was looking at magazines
7. this glass of milks is sour another glass of milk is sour too
8. the army was practicing it's drills, one group was doing artilery practicing other was marching another was attention, and the other was practicing combat tactics
9. there are seven student from japan other are from iran and the other are from other places
10. we looked at cars today the first more far too expensive, but the other ones were reasonably priced

Articles

Definition: English has two types of articles: definite (the) and indefinite (a, an.) The use of these articles depends mainly on whether you are referring to any member of a group, or to a specific member of a group:

Indefinite articles - a and an (determiners)
A and an are the indefinite articles. They refer to something not specifically known to the person you are communicating with.
A and an are used before nouns that introduce something or someone you have not mentioned before:

Examples:

* I ate an apple this morning
* I bought a pet for my son

You use a when the noun you are referring to begins with a consonant (b, c, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, q, r, s, t, v, w, x, y or z), for example, "a city" and "a factory

You use an when the noun you are referring to begins with a vowel (a, e, i, o, u)

Pronunciation changes this rule:

If the next word begins with a consonant sound when we say it, for example, "university" then we use a. If the next word begins with a vowel sound when we say it, for example "hour" then we use an.

Examples:

* We say "university" with a "y" sound at the beginning as though it were spelt "youniversity".
So, "a university" is correct.
* We say "hour" with a silent h as though it were spelt "our".
So, "an hour" is correct.


Definite Article - the (determiners)

You use the when you know that the listener knows or can work out what particular person/thing you are talking about.

Example:

* The dog (that specific dog)
* The apple (that specific apple)

You should also use the when you have already mentioned the thing you are talking about.

Example:

* She's got two children; a girl and a boy. The girl's eight and the boy's fourteen.

We use the to talk about geographical points on the globe.

Example:

* the Middle East, the West

We use the to talk about rivers, oceans and seas

Example:

* the Nile, the Pacific

We also use the before certain nouns when we know there is only one of a particular thing.

Example:

* the rain, the sun, the wind

However if you want to describe a particular instance of these you should use a/an.

Example:

* "I could hear the wind." / "There's a cold wind blowing."

Determiner

Definition: Nouns are often preceded by the words "the", "a", or "an". These words are called "determiners". They indicate the kind of reference which the noun has. The determiner "the" is known as the "definite article". It is used before both singular and plural nouns. The determiner "a" (or "an", when the following noun begins with a vowel) is the "indefinite article". It is used when the noun is singular. Determiners are used in front of nouns to indicate whether you are referring to something specific or something of a particular type.

You use a "specific determiner" when people know exactly which thing(s) or person/people you are talking about.

The specific determiners are:

The definite article : the

Demonstratives : this, that, these, those

Possessives : my, your, his, her, its, our, their

For example:

* The dog barked at the boy.
* These apples are rotten.
* Their bus was late.

You use "general determiners" to talk about people or things without saying exactly who or what they are.

The general determiners are:

the indefinite articles : a, an
a few a little all another any	both each either enough every	few fewer less little many more most much	neither no other several some

For example:

* A man sat under an umbrella.
* Have you got any English books that I could have?
* There is enough food to feed everyone.