GLOBAL WRITERS BUREAU ENGLISH GRAMMAR & WRITING STYLE COURSE
LESSON 3
- John drives.
- John is driven.
In (1) above the subject (John) is the doer of the action. Thereafter the verb is said to be active. In (2) the subject receives the action, and the verb is passive. Active verbs can take objects. To find the object if any) of a verb, we ask, “whom?” or “what?” after the verb:
- John drives an old car. (Drives what?)
- Julie assisted me. (Assisted whom?)
Note that object words (car, me) are, like subject words, always nouns or pronouns. So, when nouns or pronouns appear in sentences, they are very often subject words or object words. Otherwise they are usually following prepositions – in which case they are said to be governed by prepositions they follow:
In the water, after dinner, of anger, with a smile
Exercise 3:
Decide (in correct order) the task performed by the nouns and pronouns in the following sentences:
- He took the dog for a walk.
(A- subject, governed by preposition, object)
(B-subject, object, governed by preposition)
- Out of the house came she.
(A- subject, object)
(B-governed by preposition, subject)
- A box of nails has disappeared.
(A-subject, governed by preposition)
(B-subject, object)
- What shall we do?
(A-subject, object)
(B- object, subject)
GLOBAL WRITERS BUREAU ENGLISH GRAMMAR & WRITING STYLE COURSE
LESSON 4
Where there are verbs, there are likely to be adverbs since the most common task of the adverbs is to modify (have an altering effect upon) the verb. The most common of these adverbs are manner, time and place.
- He walks (how?) slowly. (Manner)
- He walks (when?) early. (Time)
- He walks (where?) there. (Place)
Often a group of words – introduced by a preposition and ending with a noun or pronoun modifies a verb and therefore does the work of an adverb. Such groups of words are called adverb phrases.
- He walks (how?) in a leisurely fashion. (manner)
- He walks (when?) before dawn. (time)
- He walks (where?) to the river. (place)
- He walks (why?) because of the bus strike. (reason)
- He walks (why?) to keep fit. (purpose)
- He walks (despite what?) despite his bad foot. (concession)
When breaking a sentence down, we usually collect adverbs and adverb phrases which modify the verb and put them under the heading ‘Extension of the verb.’ So we now have four main functions of the verb.
- Pamela plays tennis badly.
Exercise 4:
In the above sentence:
- Pamela is (A- subject) (B- object)
- Plays is (A- verb) (B- Object)
- Tennis is (A- object) (B- subject)
- Badly is (A-verb) (B- ext. of verb)
