In general when we look at an English sentence to see who is doing what to whom (grammatically speaking), we can say that the subject does something to the object: {subject} + does something to + {object} Jesse Owens + won + 4 gold medals. I + believe + your sister....
Nouns in English Grammar
A Noun is one of the major parts of speech. A good, general, definition of a noun is that it is something which is used to name an object or thing. car, door, elephant... There are literally thousands upon thousands of nouns in English and we regularly add new...
The Passive Voice in English Grammar
English sentences are mostly built using a simple pattern known as SVO which stands for Subject + Verb + Object: {subject} + {verb} + {object} Madeleine + broke + the wine glass. The most important information in a sentence usually comes at the beginning and...
Adjective Order in English Grammar
Adjective order concerns the order in which adjectives are used in a phrase. They usually follow this order: age color origin material purpose a new red Swiss plastic army knife We can have other types of adjectives which we put before the age. These are general...
Adverbial Clauses in English Grammar
An adverbial clause is a subordinate clause that act as the adverb in a sentence. It normally answers the questions: how, when, where, how much. We can join two clauses using a simple conjunction. She heard the door open while she was watching television. The second...
Adjectival Phrases in English
Adjectival phrases are phrases that function as adjectives. They consist of the adjective(s) that modifies a noun and any adverb(s) or other elements that modify that adjective. Adjectival phrases always occur inside noun phrases. They always have a house full of...
Articles in English Grammar
There are three types of Articles in English. Put simply, we use articles to let people know what kind of noun we're talking about. Take the word, fly, for example. If I just use the word on its own I'm speaking very generally. These flies are annoying me. If I put...
Active Voice in English Grammar
When the subject performs the action described by the verbs we talk about sentences in the Active Voice. By voice grammarians mean a grammatical category that shows whether the subject of a sentence is an actor or a recipient. In the active voice the subject is an...
Timelines, Verbs and TEFL
https://youtu.be/_TESli89qsw Timelines are a teaching aid we use to help explain how different verb tenses are used. They are a visual representation of the passage of time. This is an empty timeline: Here, the timeline shows an event in the past (last...
Language Functions and TEFL
When we talk about Language Functions, we are talking about the reason we use a language. This can be contrasted with grammar which is how the language works. Functions are why we use language: to greet people, to order a meal, to ask the time and so on. Grammar, on...