EL 102: STRUCTURE OF ENGLISH

(PRELIM)

Name: Aeleu Joverz B. Ronda Year Level and Section: 1 – BSEd English

1. Discuss the four Components/Elements of a Language.

1.1. Phonetics and Phonology - It provides systematic and well-founded understanding of the
sounds pattern in English. It is important to understand accent and language variation and to
react appropriately to them and to teach appropriate language attitudes.
• Phonetics - A system for describing and recording the sounds of language objectively.
• Phonology - It concerns itself with the ways in which language make us of sounds to
distinguish words from each other.
1.2. Morphology - It is the study of words. It is the branch of linguistics which studies the structure
of words and types of their formation. Morphemes are the minimal units of words that have
a meaning and cannot be subdivided further. It generally divided into two:
a) Free Morphemes - Can be used as single words (e.g., book, run, nice, one).
b) Bound Morphemes – Some words cannot stand alone and have to be attached to
another morpheme (e. g. un-, -ment, -ed, -s).
1.3. Syntax – the study of sentence structure, and of how sentence structure interacts with other
dimensions of linguistic information, such as phonology, morphology, semantics, and
pragmatics.
1.4. Semantics - Is the study of meaning in language. It is a branch linguistic that seeks to explain
phenomenon of meaning in natural language by means of defining the nature of word
meaning. Two ways to look at word meaning:
a) Reference/Referential Semantics/Speaker-Reference – It is what the speaker is
referring to using some linguistic expression. It refers to object. View the
relationships between the linguistic elements and the non-linguistic world of
experience.
b) Sense/Lexical Semantics/Linguistic-Reference – It is the systematic denotation of
some linguistic expression as part of a language. It is within the domain of semantics;
it deals with reference that is a systematic function of the language itself.

2. What are the different Types of Grammar?

2.1. Prescriptive - It is the traditional approach of grammar that tells people how to use the
English language, what forms they should utilize, and what functions they should serve.
Prescriptive grammar is essential as it helps people use formal English speech and writing.
Schools aim to teach prescriptive grammar to provide people a common standard of usage
(Oklahoma State University Writing Center, 2020).
• Examples:
✓ In English, less goes with mass nouns (e.g. “less money”), and “fewer” goes with
count nouns (e.g., “fewer items.”)
✓ In English, speakers should not split infinitives (e.g., “to boldly go;“) instead,
write or say (“to go boldly.”)
✓ In English, speakers should not use passive voice (e.g., “The meeting was held
by the university;”) instead, write or say (“The university held the meeting.”)
 ✓ In English, speakers should avoid phrasal verbs (e.g., “come over to have some
tea;”) instead, write or say (e.g., “visit me to have some tea.”
2.2. Descriptive – It refers to an objective, nonjudgmental description of
the grammatical constructions in a language. It's an examination of how a language is actually
being used, in writing and in speech. Descriptive grammar is the basis for dictionaries, which
record changes in vocabulary and usage, and for the field of linguistics, which aims at describing
languages and investigating the nature of language (Oklahoma State University Writing Center,
2020).
• Examples:
✓ English Adjective order: (opinion, size, physical quality, shape, age, color, origin,
material, type, and purpose (e.g., “This is a beautiful, small, green, American
island.”)
✓ Some native speakers say:
➢ “I am younger than him” instead of “I am younger than he.”
➢ “He graduated American university” instead of “He graduated from
American university."
➢ “I ain't going nowhere.” instead of “I am not going anywhere.”
2.3. Generative - Is a theory of grammar, first developed by Noam Chomsky in the 1950s, that is
based on the idea that all humans have an innate language capacity. Generative grammar accepts
as a basic premise that native speakers of a language will find certain sentences grammatical or
ungrammatical and that these judgments give insight into the rules governing the use of that
language. Linguists who study generative grammar are not interested in prescriptive rules; rather,
they are interested in uncovering the foundational principals that guide all language production.
It attempts to get at something deeper—the foundational principles that make language possible
across all of humanity (Nordquist, 2020).
• As generative grammar is a "theory of competence," one way to test its validity is with
what is called a grammaticality judgment task. This involves presenting a native speaker
with a series of sentences and having them decide whether the sentences are
grammatical (acceptable) or ungrammatical (unacceptable). For example:
✓ The man is happy.
✓ Happy man is the.
• A native speaker would judge the first sentence to be acceptable and the second to be
unacceptable. From this, we can make certain assumptions about the rules governing how
parts of speech should be ordered in English sentences. For instance, a "to be" verb linking
a noun and an adjective must follow the noun and precede the adjective.
2.4. Performance - It aims to describe and explain intuitive judgments and other data concerning
the well-formedness of sentences of a language, but at the same time it contributes to accounts
of syntactic processing phenomena observable during language comprehension and language
production (Performance Grammar, n.d.).

3. Review the Eight Parts of Speech and its Kinds. Give five (5) examples under each.
3.1. Noun – It refers to a person, concept, place or thing.
• Examples:
✓ Girl
✓ Pirate
✓ Planet
✓ Hamburger
✓ Orange
3.2. Pronoun - Used in place of a noun.
• Examples:
✓ They are good at playing basketball.
✓ She has many chocolates in her pocket.
✓ You have come to my wallet in the room.
✓ I had forgotten my wallet in the room.
✓ Everybody was present when I entered the classroom.
3.3. Adjective – Modifies a noun or pronoun.
• Examples:
✓ They live in a beautiful house.
✓ He writes meaningless letters.
✓ Ben is an adorable baby.
✓ Linda’s hair is gorgeous.
✓ This glass is breakable.
3.4. Verb – Describes an action, occurrence, or state of being.
• Examples:
✓ I baked a huge birthday cake for my son.
✓ I changed our Wi-Fi password to a more complicated one.
✓ I found my keys under the mat.
✓ The cleaner scrubbed the floors of the kitchen.
✓ The parent collected her child from kindergarten.
3.5. Adverb – It modifies a verb, adjective, adverb, or whole sentence.
• Examples:
✓ She was walking slowly.
✓ My friend and I ran quickly to get the bus.
✓ He stopped the car abruptly.
✓ My grandfather smiled cheerfully.
✓ Dina spoke boldly in front of a huge audience.
3.6. Preposition – Used to show the relationship between the different parts of a sentence.
• Examples:
✓ The supermarket will be closed from 9 p.m. to 9 a.m.
✓ Can you come after some time?
✓ Will you be with Raimy or Mazeeka?
✓ I love sitting beside the beach at night.
✓ Rachel met Phoebe by the lake.
3.7. Interjection – Used in isolation to express a feeling, give a command, or greet someone.
• Examples:
✓ Hurray! We won the match.
✓ Ouch! That really hurt badly.
✓ Wow! That is a beautiful dress indeed.
✓ Oh my God! That was unexpected.
✓ Whoa! That guy is unbelievably huge.
3.8. Conjunction – Connects different parts of a sentence.
• Examples:
✓ I can pass after the green light is on.
✓ Although she speaks seldom, she says meaningful words.
✓ I went to bed at 10 pm as I had a plane to catch at 7 am.
 ✓ She talks as if he was rich.
✓ You can go as long as you are good.
EL 102: STRUCTURE OF ENGLISH
(MIDTERM)
Name: Aeleu Joverz B. Ronda Year Level and Section: 1 – BSEd English
1. Discuss all the VERB TENSES and be able to give at least 2 examples under each. Show all the
Verb Tenses and its examples on a table chart.
Verb Tenses Definition
Present Simple When you use the present
simple, you are using a routine.
It is something that you always
do every day, month, or year. Or
it is something that you never
do.
Present When you use present
Continuous/Progressive continuous, you are referring to
what is happening right now.
Also, it can be an action that is
not yet complete.
Present Perfect The action is complete for
present perfect. In other words,
you are looking at the result
right now without any words
referring to time.
Present Perfect the action starts in the past but
Continuous/Progressive it’s still continuing now. You
have been performing the action
and still are performing the
action in the present.
Past Simple For past simple, it includes a
finished action and time.
Past Continuous/Progressive When you use past continuous,
you are often using two actions.
However, one action is not
finished in the past, and another
completely interrupts the other
action.
Past Perfect This verb tense uses two actions
at two different times. Before
the second action occurs, the
first action is complete.
Examples
1) We travel every day.
2) She travels every day
1) I am traveling right
now.
2) They are traveling right
now.
1) They have traveled to
France.
2) She has traveled to
France.
1) You have been
traveling for a day.
2) He has been traveling
for a day.
1) You traveled to France
yesterday.
2) He lived in Fiji in 1976.
1) I was traveling by bus
when the deer crossed
the road.
2) They were traveling
when the deer crossed
the road.
1) She had traveled by car
when the bus arrived.
2) We had played video
games.
 Past Perfect A tense that has a complete
Continuous/Progressive action that happened before a
second action. But in this case,
you can describe how long.
Future Simple This verb tense is about planning
things to do in the future.
Future Perfect The action will be completed in
the future before another is
completed.
Future Continuous/Progressive The action is not complete when
another action happens in the
future. This is similar to past
continuous, but it refers to the
future.
Future Perfect An action will be continuing in
Continuous/Progressive the future when it is interrupted
by another action. This future
verb tense often includes an
indication of how long the action
has been happening.
1) We had been traveling
for one hour when the
car broke down.
2) I had been working at
the company for five
years when I got the
promotion.
1) I will travel to France
tomorrow.
2) They will dance to
France Tomorrow.
1) It will have traveled to
France by the time you
arrive.
2) I will have finished this
book.
1) We will be traveling
when you arrive.
2) Sheldon will be eating
the cake later.
1) I will have been
traveling for one hour
when you arrive.
2) When I finish this
course, I will have been
learning English for
twenty years.

References:
Nordquist, R. (2020, March 22). Generative Grammar: Definition and Examples. ThoughtCo.
https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-generative-grammar-1690894
Oklahoma State University Writing Center. (2020, October 30). Prescriptive and Descriptive Grammar —
The Writing Center. The Writing Center.
https://osuwritingcenter.okstate.edu/blog/2020/10/30/prescriptive-and-descriptive-grammar
Performance Grammar. (n.d.). https://userpages.uni-
koblenz.de/~harbusch/pg.html#:~:text=It%20aims%20to%20describe%20and,language%20com
prehension%20and%20language%20production.