Really Basic English Grammar

UGS303 Visible Speech

Parts of Speech

1. Noun: a word signifying a concrete or abstract idea, like a person, place, or
object (e.g. dog, tree, David, happiness)
2. Pronoun: a word which is substituted for a noun (e.g. he, she, they, it, them)
3. Adjective: a word that modifies or describes a noun (e.g. blue, happy, big)
4. Verb: a word signifying an activity or process performed or undergone (e.g.
run, jump, think, be, sit)
5. Participle: a part of speech sharing the features of the verb and the noun 6.
Preposition: a part of speech placed before other words in composition and in
syntax, describing a relationship between two objects (e.g. on, by, to, for) 7.
6. Adverb: describes the action of the verb (e.g. when, where, how, how often, to
what extent something happens) 8. Conjunction: a word that binds together
phrases (e.g. and, but, because) 9. Interjection: a part of speech expressing
emotion alone

Basic Sentence Elements

1. Subject: the actor or doer of the action/verb. e.g. David is the king, David,
went to . . .
2. Predicate: the part of a sentence describing the subject (with a verb). e.g.
David is the king.
3. Direct Object: the noun directly affected by the subjects action. e.g. David
sent a message.
4. Indirect Object: a noun affected by the verb, but not the primary recipient of
its action (usually expressed as to or for.) e.g. David sent a message to
Bathsheba. OR David sent Bathsheba a message.
5. Adverbial Phrase: a word or phrase describing the manner in which the
action of the verb was performed. e.g. David sent a message to Bathsheba
secretly.
6. Prepositional Phrase: a word or phrase modified by a preposition (including
the preposition itself ). e.g. Bathsheba was on the roof.