Raysha

Syntax

Word Classes

Noun

Noun is a word which used to identify any class of things, places, persons even ideas. Nounn mostly
come with an article ( such as a, an, the ). Nouns can function in different roles within a sentence; for
example, a noun can be a subject, direct object, indirect object, subject complement, or object of a
preposition.
 a person ( girl, boy, artist, neighbour ).
 a thing ( cat, flower, tree, country ).
 an idea, quality, or state (truth, danger, birth, sadness).

Proper nouns
A proper noun is the name of a particular (specific) person, place thing, or idea and begin with
Capital letter.
 Zendaya goes to Hogwarts Elementary

Common Noun
A common noun refes to any and every person or thing of the same kind or class, not a particular
person or thing.
 Timothee went to grocery early this morning

Collective noun
Collective noun a special class, name groups (things) composed of members (usually people).
 The rock group has been on tour for months

Materials nouns
A material nouns is the name of a material, substance, or ingredient things are made of.
 The cow gives us milk.

Abstract and Concrete nouns

An abstract noun is the name of a quality, state, or concept.
 beauty, sweetness, childhood, love, etc.

Pronoun

Pronoun is a word which can function as a noun phrase used by itself and that refers either to the
participants in the discourse ( such as I, you ) or even to someone or something mentioned ( such as
she, these, etc ). A pronoun is usually substituted for a specific noun. Pronouns are further defined
by type: personal pronouns refer to specific persons or things; possessive pronouns indicate
ownership; reflexive pronouns are used to emphasize another noun or pronoun; relative pronouns
introduce a subordinate clause; and demonstrative pronouns identify, point to, or refer to nouns.
 I was tired so I went to bed.
  Zoey took the children with him.
 That Fender Telecaster is mine.
Personal pronouns
Personal pronouns are used in place of nouns referring to people or things ( such as
I, me, mine, you, yours, his, her, hers, we, they, or them). It can be divide d into various different
categories according to their role in a sentence, as follows :
 Subjective pronouns
 Objective pronouns
 Possessive pronouns
 Reflexive pronouns

Subjective pronouns
The personal pronouns ( such as I, you, we, he, she, it, and they ) are known as subjective pronouns
because they act as the subjects of verbs :
 She saw Timmie.
 We drove Kepo home.
 I waved at her.

Objective pronouns
The personal pronouns ( such as me, you, us, him, her, it, and them ) are called objective pronouns
because they act as the objects of verbs and preposition :
 Timmie saw her.
 Kepo drove us home.
 She waved at me.

Here’s a table setting out the different forms:

  SINGULAR  PLURAL
  subjective objective subjective objective
first person I me we us
second you you you you
person
third person he/she/it/they  him/her/it/them they them

Possessive pronouns
The personal pronouns ( such as mine, yours, hers, his, ours, and theirs ) are known as possessive
pronouns: they refer to something owned by the speaker or by someone or something previously
mentioned.
 That skirt is mine.
 Matt’s eyes met hers.
 Ours is a family farm.

Reflexive pronouns
Reflexive personal pronouns ( such as myself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves,
and themselves). These are used to refer back to the subject of the clause in which they are used.
 I fell and hurt myself.
 Lula prepared herself for the journey.
 The children had to look after themselves.
 Adverb

Adverbs are the next part of word classes that have the role of describing a verb. Adverbs can also
function to modify verbs, adjectives or fellow adverbs. An adverb can perform the role of describing
or explaining in other words when, how and where something happened. Most of the words in the
adverb class have the ending - ly.
 Quickly, mostly, never, here, tomorrow, slowly, very.
 He never had an accident as a cyclist, you can see him ride his bicycle slowly.

Adjective

Adjective is a word which is naming an attribute of a noun. It usually modifies or describes a noun or
a pronoun, even gives extra information about the noun or pronun. An ajdective is a word that
describes a noun, giving extra information about it.
 a sweet corn
 a white Grande piano
 a British girl

Verb

Verb is a word which used to describe an action, and state. The verb in a sentence expresses action
or being. A verb must agree with its subject in number ( such as singular or plural ). Verbs also take
different forms to express tense.
 an action – run, hit, travel
 an event – rain, occur
 a situation – be, seem, have
 a change – become, grow, develop

The basic form of a verb is known as the infinitive. It’s often preceded by the word ‘to’.
 Joe decided to kill him.
 Candace began to run back.

Preposition

A preposition is a word which placed before a noun or pronoun to form a phrase modifying another
word in the sentence. Therefore a preposition is always part of a prepositional phrase. The
prepositional phrase almost always functions as an adjective or as an adverb. 

Here are the mostcommonly used prepositions : above, across, against, along, among, around, at,
before, behind, below, beneath, beside, between, by, down, from, in, into, near, of, off, on, to,
toward, under, upon, with and within.
 We went to the top of the mountain. ( to describes the relationship
between went and top; of describes the relationship between top and mountain ).
 Are you ready for dinner yet? ( for describes the relationship between ready and lunch ).
 Conjunction

A conjunction is a word which used to connect clauses or sentences or to coordinate words in the

same clause ( such as and, but, if, or ). Coordinating conjunctions connect grammatically equal
elements: and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet. Subordinating conjunctions connect clauses that are not
equal: because, although, while, since, etc. 
 Mittie and Brownie are brothers.
 It was okay, but I wouldn’t recommend it as a good place to relax.
 We’ll reach out to you when we get to London.

Article

An article is a word used to modify a noun, which is a person, place, object, or idea. Technically, an
article is an adjective, which is any word that modifies a noun. Usually adjectives modify nouns
through description, but articles are used instead to point out or refer to nouns. There are two
different types of articles that we use in writing and conversation to point out or refer to a noun or
group of nouns: definite and indefinite articles.

Definite Article
Let's begin by looking at the definite article. This article is the word 'the,' and it refers directly to a
specific noun or groups of nouns. For example : 
 the freckles on my face 
 the breakfast pancake on my plate 
Each noun or group of nouns being referred to - in these cases freckles and breakfast pancake is
direct and specific. 

Indefinite Articles
Indefinite articles are the words 'a' and 'an.' Each of these articles is used to refer to a noun, but the
noun being referred to is not a specific person, place, object, or idea. It can be any noun from a
group of nouns. For example : 
 a Benz from the car lot 
 an event in history 
In each case, the noun is not specific. The Benz could be any Benz car available for purchase, and the
event could be any event in the history of the world.

Numeral

A numeral is a number which we recognise two kinds, namely the cardinal numerals, e.g. one, two,
three, etc., and the ordinal numerals, e.g. first, second, third, etc.  
A numeral also classifies the numerals as determiners, but puts them in
a subclass called postdeterminers. These are determiners that are positioned after central
determiners ( such as a(n), the, this, that, these, my, etc ) though they can also occur on their own.
 those three years
 the many books (I read)
 the first two years
 much food
The ordinal numerals are also postdeterminers, and that we can have two of them in sequence.
 all the solutions
 both those pages

The all three types of determiner that occur together :

 all the many hours ( that we spent together )

Quantifier

A quantifier is a word or phrase which is used before a noun to indicate the amount or quantity
( such as 'Some', 'many', 'a lot of' and 'a few' ) are examples of quantifiers.
 There are some books on the desk
 He's got only a few dollars.
 How much money have you got?
 There is a large quantity of fish in this river.
 He's got more friends than his sister.

Quantifiers with uncountable nouns

 much
 a little/little/very little 
 a bit ( of )
 a great deal of
 a large amount of
 a large quantity of 
With Both
 all
 enough
 more/most
 less/least
 no/none
 not any
 some 
 any
 a lot of
 lots of
 plenty of

With Countable Nouns

 many
 a few/few/very few
 a number (of)
 several
 a large number of
 a great number of
 a majority of