Introducing a New Product
THE SENTENCE
The basic sentence
A sentence is a group of words that contains a subject and a
verb, and expresses a complete idea.
Examples:Birds fly.
Susan laughed.
()
Additions to the basic sentence (i)
The sentence may also contain:Direct and indirect objects:Dave
wrote a letter to me
Describing words (adjectives and adverbs):I could not lift the
heavy box.
I lifted the box easily.
Time expressions:I usually phone my grandparents once a
week.
Additions to the basic sentence (ii)
Complements (additions manner, place, time)She hid the money
under the bag.
The 3 main kinds of sentences
Simple sentencesHe could not move the rock.
Compound sentences (2 simple joined by a conjunction)He tried
hard BUT he could not move the rock.
Complex sentences I enjoyed the film WHICH we saw last
night.
Word Order
The word order of an English sentence is very fixed.
SUBJECTVERBOBJECT (S)ADDITIONS
DianaThe childrenTheyIisseemedvisitwill return
their cousinsit to youa good studentvery happy yesterdayevery
summernext week
Word Order (ii)
Never separate the verb from its object(s). We CANNOT say:They
visit every summer their cousins.
Time expressions can also come at the beginning of the
sentence.Every summer they visit their cousins.
Punctuation
A sentence must begin with a capital letter and end with a full
stop (.), a question mark (?) or an exclamation mark (!).
We put a comma (,) between items in a list, but not before the
words and or orHe suddenly stopped talking, turned and started to
run.
You may order coffee, tea, orange juice or lemonade.
