In this lesson we're going to talk about clauses now clauses are really important because they form
the building blocks of sentences so early.
You'll remember we talked about parts of speech which were basically just words.
Well now we combine those words to form clauses and clauses can be a sentence by themselves.
For example you know I exist.
I exist is a subject plus a verb I is a subject it's a noun or pronoun in this case.
And of course exist is the verb.
Now that's a complete sentence.
I EXIST OK but of course you can join clauses together to form longer sentences but in today's lesson
we're focusing on making sure we understand how you can make one clause.
So here are three examples of very similar sentences but they all contain the word John at the beginning
which is the subject of these particular clauses.
John is followed by eats and eats is the verb John's action is to eat.
So John eats.
Subject verb.
John it's an apple.
John.
It's an apple in his room.
These are all complete clauses.
Now you can ignore the stuff that comes after a verb.
It's the object of the verb here.
OK so as long as the meaning makes sense it doesn't really affect the structure of the Clauson much
we only care about the subject and the verb.
So these are three examples of in a perfectly good clauses.
These would be three examples of fragments fragments and when you don't have a complete clause.
Now in these three cases you can see that we have three subjects.
John John John but there's no verb there eating.
If you remember from our previous lesson or a couple lessons ago eating is never a verb.
It's either a participle or a giant because eating is never a verb.
These sentences like verbs so we never had to have a complete clause.
So these are fragments and they are wrong sentences.
Now a lot of you may be saying well I mean that's pretty obvious.
If I look at the sentence it doesn't sound right at all.
Well you know that may be the case but as sentences get longer and harder you'll find the college board
deliberately tries to trick you so that you don't notice these kind of situations as much so here are
a couple of other cases which are also fragments although we have subjects and verbs.
I mean you have to be careful to make sure that the verb actually matches up with that first subject.
And in these two cases you'll see that actually these verbs link to other words.
It's Tom that it's and it's who that is young.
Ok so of course he refers to John but you know technically speaking who is the subject for the verb
is.
Now you may not be that familiar with these particular sentence types but we'll learn about these in
later lessons.
I will learn about this first sentence type in the very next lesson and learn about the who clause or
the relative pronoun in the lesson on mortifies.
Down the road.
OK.
But the important point here is hey we never had a verb describing John directly.
Similarly this would be just a bad example because we have here John he is an apple.
But we had two subjects again John he John he and it's like where does it belong to belong with he or
John.
I shouldn't have two subjects I'm really flying through this part here because you know most of you
would think this is pretty easy stuff and you know you think to yourself Well you know it just sounds
wrong.
I won't get this wrong.
So I mean that's fine but remember if you do start getting these problems wrong later to come back and
you know watch this lecture again.
Day was one point I do want to mention here is that you have to be careful of prepositions because nouns
come after prepositions and never ever ever the subject of a clause.
So look here at home is relaxing.
It doesn't sound too bad it's not as egregious or as terrible as you know John eating but it is in fact
wrong.
You may ask yourself well wait a second there's the noun home and there's the verb is.
So isn't that correct.
But just as I noted above.
No it's not correct because that is a preposition.
And if you have a proposition that means that home is not the subject of the sentence hence this particular
sentence is not a complete clause it never had a subject for the verb is how do you know whether word
of preparation or not.
Well I mean you either know or you don't.
That's one way to think about it.
Or another way to test that word in different situations.
So how would you ever use that in another sentence.
You know I might say I'm at home and at school I met my friend at the mall every single case I can think
of requires that at has a noun after it.
So that means it must be a proposition.
OK so let's recap.
A clause is the basic building block of a sentence and it must have a subject verb and make sure that
the verb linked to the subject that you are focusing on let's take a look at this very simple example.
Dark energy which caused the universe to expand.
It has been present for most of the universe's history.
OK so if you need to pause here to kind of think through what drenched and the truth would be or will
be.
And again most of you will get this right without a problem.
It's not just about getting it right.
You must understand why that answer choice is correct and the others are incorrect.
All right so if you have your answer ready.
Let's take a look at this dark energy.
It's the first noun of the sentence right.
Energy in this case because dark describes the energy it's energy that's the subject here.
Well where's the verb for energy and energy which cause hey causes is the verb cause is a verb.
But which which is just like who except instead of a people you apply to things.
So which is a subject for causes because who and which form new clauses.
OK so that's not the verb for energy.
So let's keep going which causes the universe to expand.
It has oh there's a verb has as has been present for most of the universe's history.
OK.
So I had the verb but in a way you can see that I have it in front of has.
So if it is the noun for it has or the pronoun here then there's never a verb or energy.
So a is incorrect.
Similarly B must be incorrect C must be incorrect because for all these verbs has had has we are now
in front of it or pronoun in front of them.
So they weren't I didn't have a clear verb for the subject energy.
That leaves me with the.
And of course we already found out all we already know that having energy is never a verb.
Hence the must be the answer.
Dark energy has been present for most of the universe's history.
That is the correct answer has OK.
Let's look at a slightly more difficult example.
Pose it if you need to take a look at the sentence.
Pick the answer that you think is correct and then explain to yourself why that is the correct answer.
Besides publishing poetry for adults.
Gary Soter who is writing numerous collections of short stories and novels for children.
Well besides publishing poetry for adults.
Look I mean you may not be able to break down this particular phrase yet so I'll do it for you.
But don't stress out if you can't do it.
It'll come with time.
But besides as an adverb publishing here is a participle.
What's he publishing.
He's publishing poetry for who for adults.
So add verb.
And then I have a participle phrase here.
Right a phrase.
What does that mean.
What am I talking about.
Well basically I'm trying to explain that this isn't a subject because it's describing something right.
There was never a noun here that acts as the subject because although there are two nouns poetry and
adults all poetry belonged to the participle publishing he was describing what he's publishing publishing
poetry adults came after Proposition 4.
So I know that's not the subject.
So nothing he was the subject.
But you know you might say yourself I kind of do that I can't do that kind of analysis that I'm not
that familiar with grammar yet.
Don't stress.
An easy way to think of it is look.
Publishing poetry is describing is describing somebody or something right.
So if it's describing somebody or something.
It's not the subject it's a modifier it's describing something in this whole thing acts kind as an adjective
or in this case adverbial phrase because I'm saying Besides or in addition to doing this again about
all the grammar terms I'm saying not a big deal.
Just say nothing here is a subject because it's describing something.
So if that's the case and what's the subject.
Oh Gary Soto That's describing Gary Soto who is the subject so Gary Soto is my subject.
So if that's the case where's my verb.
I don't see any verbs here.
There is a Says who is writing but of course we know that is if that's the verb who is the subject.
So when you cross off a could be.
Nope no verbs there.
C No verbs there d up as a verb has.
So maybe that's OK he Nope no verbs there.
So actually if we got rid of all the grammatically correct answers I'm only left with D as a possible
choice because these the only answer choice which gave me a blurb for the subject.
Gary Soto Hey Okay.
Last one last example.
A bit trickier.
A lot of people get this question wrong.
So let's look at let's look at it a great grey owl flying low across a forest clearing its wings beating
quite linnets ultrasensitive ears tuned to the faint sounds made by small creatures concealed under
leaves.
Holy cow.
That's a long sentence.
Well I'm telling you right now that there's an error in the sentence and it's to do with fragments and
clauses.
Right.
Right now if you read this you should be able to tell that it's a fragment.
So take your time pause and try to understand why the fragment and when you're ready as human I'll explain
this particular sentence.
So if I start from the beginning a great great album.
Well there's my first noun now.
It's probably my subject here right.
As the subject.
Where's my verb.
Flying low across the forest clearing of verbs there it's wings beating quietly NURBS there and it's
Ultracet of ultrasensitive is tuned to the faint sounds is tuned to Verby Oh I know I can tune things
I tune my car I tune the TV to that station or the radio to that station so it can be of the past tense
of the verb tune.
But you have to ask yourself is it a verb or is it a participle because it could also be the past participle
here and the easy test is is that word or the noun that's before it.
Is it doing the action.
Is it actually doing something or is it describing that word.
So are the ears tuned to something is tuned to describing the is the TV tuned to CNN is blaring loudly
right in that sentence tune wasn't a verb was describing the TV it's tuned to CNN the verb was is the
TV is blurring in the same way here.
The is actually tuning in and being right there not changing the channel or doing anything like that
we're describing these as being tuned to the sounds right and sort of been tuned to CNN that tuned to
the sounds.
So the easy way to test that is just ask yourself hey if I insert before the word tonight or any other
potential parsable if I insert the words that are all that is in front of them if I can insert that
that makes more sense then that means it's a participle.
So let's check that it's ultrasensitive.
Is that our tune to the faint sound.
OK.
That makes sense.
It's describing the ears that are tuned hence tune.
Here is a participle.
OK.
So it's sort of is that attuned to the sounds.
Same thing here.
The sounds that are made by so again make is not a verb.
The sound on making anything up it sounds that are made by small creatures that are concealed under
leaves so tuned made can see they all look like past tense verbs.
But actually I can put that in front of all of them.
They're not verbs.
Tune's describes is made describes the sounds the sounds are made by small creatures that are concealed
under leaves.
So I never had a verb in this sentence.
Where can I put a verb that would make the most sense and not cause any grammatical issues.
It has to be a a great grey owl flying low across a forest clearing should become perhaps flew low flies
low.
Either way it doesn't matter.
But I need a verb here.
Might need a verb here.
Now I know that the owl flew across so far as clearing the rest of the stuff in the back.
It's just a modifier it says describing the owl.
OK again.
Well if you're not really that confident with mollifies you know we'll get to that later on.
But the important thing here is what did the great owl do.
Well there was no way for me to fix the sentence except to make a verb because if I put B if I fixed
B and said it wings beat quietly I wouldn't have a problem where I had the hours the subject and the
wings as a subject so I never I would still never have a verb for OWL.
So the only place to fix a sentence here in this case was in a here's another example.
Let's take a look at this clause up him because philosophy philosophies the subject here philosophy
teaching students not what to think but how to think the age old discipline as a subject offers as a
verb consistently useful tools for academic and professional achievement.
Now because those are because it's a conjunction I expected two clauses.
I'm going to explain this in the next lesson.
Well we talk about joining clauses.
But for now you know that the second clause here discipline offers is attached to that first clause
because joins two clauses.
But in my first course I had a subject philosophy with the verb philosopher philosophy what does philosophy
do.
Teaching.
If you remember is not a verb.
It's either adjourned a noun or a participle an adjective.
So there's no verb for what philosophy does in the current answer choice.
Similarly C is an infinitive to teach.
It's not a verb.
And you can see also has no verb it's teaching.
The only possible answer is teaches teaches is a verb.
Philosophy teaches students subject verb.
So be is the answer there.