English Grammar Overview Quiz

English Grammar Overview

Grammar is the foundation of any written or spoken communication in English. It's what makes our sentences clear, concise, and complete. Understanding grammar rules helps us make sure we are using pronouns correctly, conjunctions effectively, and punctuation accurately. This overview will touch on some key components of English grammar.

Subjects and Verbs

The subject of a sentence is typically the noun or pronoun doing something—often represented by I or he or she. The verb tells you what the subject does; it can indicate an action (runs) or a state of being (am happy). Both the subject and verb must agree in person and number:

I walk home every day. He walks home every day. She walks home every day. They walk home every day. We walk home every day. But *you* don't!

In this example, notice how each line uses a different personal pronoun. And they all have their own unique verbal form.

Pronouns

Pronouns are used instead of names to refer back to someone already mentioned earlier in your sentences. There are several categories of pronouns including personal, relative, demonstrative, interrogatory, reflexive, reciprocal, numeral, and intensive. Each type serves its specific purpose within sentencing structure:

I went out yesterday. Yesterday was my first time going outside in months.

Here, "I" refers to the narrative voice telling the story while "yesterday" acts like a relative pronoun providing more information about when things happened.

Conjunctions

Conjunctions connect words, phrases, clauses or even entire sentences together making them more cohesive and grammatically correct. For instance:

She likes art, music, and literature too. Art, music, and literature - just three passions shared between friends.

Both sentences above use commas between items listed after conjunctions. Otherwise known as serial comma or Oxford Comma.

Prepositions

Prepositional phrases consist of two parts - a preposition followed by a word or phrase called its object. A preposition shows relationship between words in terms location, direction, time etc., such as in sentences like:

He walked under the tree because it was raining heavily. She drove her car through town towards home.

These examples demonstrate basic usage of common prepositions like 'under', 'through', 'to' etc..

Sentence Structure

Sentences come in various forms depending upon their intended function: declarative (statement), interrogative (question), imperative (command), exclamatory (exclamation), and negative (emotive expression). They may also contain dependent clauses which cannot stand alone without help from independent clause:

Though I had many reasons why leaving school early would be best for me right now, deep down inside, there were mixed feelings. The boy who sat next to him during class often teased him mercilessly about his weight issue; however, whenever anyone asked if anything bothered him much, he always responded with calmness and politeness. Faced with these dilemmas repeatedly made him reflect upon whether staying longer at high school really benefited him.

This excerpt displays complex sentence structure with multiple dependent clauses connected via semicolons and commas.