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English Grammar 101: Sentences, Clauses and Phrases

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Welcome to English Grammar 101, the newest category on Daily Writing Tips. I thought that creating a series of posts covering the basic grammar rules and parts of speech would be useful to many people, especially if you consider the diversity of our readership.

On this first post we’ll cover sentences, clauses and phrases.

Sentences

Sentences are made of two parts: the subject and the predicate.

The subject is the person or thing that acts or is described in the sentence. The predicate, on the other hand, is that action or description.

Complete sentences need both the subject and the predicate.

Clauses

Sentences can be broken down into clauses. For example:

The boy is going to the school, and he is going to eat there.

This is a complete sentence composed of two clauses. There are mainly two types of clauses: independent clauses and subordinate clauses.

Independent clauses act as complete sentences, while subordinate clauses cannot stand alone and need another clause to complete their meaning. For example:

Independent clause: “The boy went to the school.”
Subordinate clause: “After the boy went to the school…”

Phrases

A group of two or more grammatically linked words that do not have subject and predicate is a phrase. For example:

The girl is at home, and tomorrow she is going to the amusement park.

You can see that “the amusement park” is a phrase located in the second clause of the complete sentence above.

Phrases act like parts of speech inside clauses. That is, they can act as nouns, adjectives, adverbs and so on.

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143 thoughts on “English Grammar 101: Sentences, Clauses and Phrases”

  1. Nice to see so many people working hard to improve there English. After reading a few posts, i could see the way people are trying to improve. It could be seen in their words. All the very best to each.
    As said, if you have the will, you’ll definetly get the way.

  2. Hello..i am terribly confused right now..which is grammatically correct, i didn’t know you like crabs or i didn’t know you liked crabs? And, i didn’t know singing scare you or i didn’t know singing scare you or i didn’t know singing scares you? Please help me

  3. Hello..i am terribly confused right now..which is grammatically correct, i didn’t know you like crabs or i didn’t know you liked crabs? And, i didn’t know singing scare you or i didn’t know singing scared you or i didn’t know singing scares you? Please help me

  4. please i want to know wich is correct:me and you or i and you and need some illustrations ……thank you

  5. I have forgotten what the proper punctuation is for titles. What should I do when its a Magazine vs. Book vs. Play vs. Movie? Some are italicized, underlined, bolded.

  6. i m truly satisfied to be a part of this website because it is helping me much .
    pallab
    from Bangladesh

  7. I’m very thankful to be fart of this website, please help me to improve my grammar, thank you very much

  8. My son has been given a task to write sentences with phrases in them. We don’t really know what it means.
    Help anybody?

  9. to otman mahjoub:
    If you’re acting, then it will be “you and I” (e.g. “you and I will go to the park tomorrow”), but when somebody is acting towards you, use “you and me” (e.g. “they will explain it to you and me”)
    Hope it helps

  10. i want improve my English
    i want speak English properly in future
    i want write, read, & speak English perfectly

  11. i want to learn English writing and speaking power. It is my greatest desire and want to fulfill it so someone is requested to guide me how can i improve my speaking and writing power in English.

  12. I’m really happy to subscribe here, it is pleasure to say I want to be a bilingual teacher of english and arabic. I can help who really needs within the site colleagues.

    happy english writing.
    ahmedpass

  13. I think vocab in english is just like any other practice. i.e if you use grasp instead of understand and you use to say it in your daily conversations it will be normal

  14. i’m in my second year at the university ,and i have many probleme in english language i can”t express my ideas and i have a problme in grammar and in the structure of the sentence and in tense i don’t know when i use all so tense .beacuse of this i feel i’m stupid when i see my classemate speak english fluently and write a big phara and essay without any probleme ..plz help me to improve my english

  15. I want to improve my English language. i have a problme in grammar and in the structure of the sentence and in tense i don’t know when i use all so tense .

  16. I was helping my sister pack her dishes and the follow statement was made.

    I don’t want the dish to get broke.
    I don’t want the dish to get broken.

    Which is correct.

  17. Hello! U guys are great and doing well cause i can see people’s comment on your page. Today is my first time on your web page, i was given presentation on clause and phrase with their examples to be summited week. Also i have grammar problem mostly on structure of english language and i need your help to throw more light on the topic.

  18. Daniel, you wrote:

    Daniel on November 13, 2007 9:04 pm
    Benjamin, the comma on that spot is a matter of style. It is the same as in these two examples:
    I like three fruits: apple, banana, and lemon.
    I like three fruits: apple, banana and lemon.
    Both versions are correct; they just represent two different styles.

    I am not sure you are correct in using that example as a comparison because one is a list separator, and the other separates two different clauses. I believe that Benjimin is correct.

    It is also arguable that a comma or an omitted comma before the last item in a list changes the meaning of the sentence. A comma clearly defines that the last item is a separate entity in the list; whereas an omitted comma would indicate that the last two items are grouped together as a single item in the list.

    I may be off the mark, but I thought it would be worth submitting for discussion.

  19. Really, am looking for for help since i have done toefl for three times but had 72 instead of a minimum of 80 points needed.
    My problems are with the reading, and when to use commas in a sentence.

  20. I wanna speak very good english please guide me and send me useful materials for removing gramatical error.

  21. i wnat to use english phrases in sentences for example instead of died we can write take his last breath so which website i visit to learn this can some one guide me.

  22. am often told to paraphrase my sentences by my supervisors, what is the problem with the sentences.

  23. I am often told to paraphrase my sentences by my supervisors, what is the problem with the sentences.

  24. I was searching for recurring and reoccurring and found this site. Why do so many places say reoccurring is okay to use but it’s not in the dictionary? I have always used recurring. Can any give me their insight on it? Thanks.

  25. Hi,this is preeti and i m trying to improve my english on daily basis.And how can i dcrease my grammatical mistakes.can i improve with the help of NET.can i chat with anybody with your help.

  26. please help me about english,that i want can speek english & i want some understand problem, while i could in future full command in english pls. sir i always your respect if u to help me for spoken english… Thanku so much, Puneet Sharma, Bulandshahr (u.p.)

  27. Hello,
    I can speak english but the only problem occur is i am unable to improve my grammatical mistakes. Kindly help me for improving my grammar and also vocabulary so that i can speak well.
    Thanks and Regards
    Lavina

  28. I’m really want to speaking a well english for good impresstion among the people but sometimes a problem is that i have need to be think what should i express ???
    Even if I learnt so many gammer books …………
    So give me some tips to learnt a best way of speaking perfect englsh… I’m waiting!!!!!!

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