Now we know that a sentence is a group of words that express a complete idea. Ideally, a sentence must have at least one subject (visible or hidden) and one verb. The verb must be present and visible. It is called the heart of a sentence. The subject is usually a noun — a word that names a person, place, or thing. The verb usually follows the subject and identifies an action or a state of being. From here we can discuss the types of sentence structures.
The following statements are true about sentences in English.
There are six basic elements in a sentence:
1. Independent clause: An independent clause can stand alone as a sentence. It contains a subject and a verb is a complete idea.
2. Dependent clause: A dependent clause is not a complete sentence. It must be attached to an independent clause to become complete. This is also known as a subordinate clause.
3. Subject: A person, animal, place, thing, or concept that does an action. Determine the subject in a sentence by asking the question “Who or what?”
4. Verb: Expresses what the person, animal, place, thing, or concept does. Determine the verb in a sentence by asking the question “What was the action or what happened?”
5. Object: A person, animal, place, thing or concept that receives the action. Determine the object in a sentence by asking the question “The subject did what?”, “To whom?, or “For whom?”
6. Prepositional phrase: A phrase that begins with a preposition (i.e. in, at, for, behind, until, after, of, during) and modifies a word in the sentence. A prepositional phrase answers one of many questions. Here are a few examples: “Where? When? In what way?”
There are four basic sentence structures: simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex.
Let's learn them through examples.
A simple sentence must have a single clause (a single verb) that is independent, and it cannot take another clause. An independent clause is a group of words that express a complete thought and can stand alone as a sentence.
1. He plays handball.
2. Susan writes a letter.
3. Ana makes a cake.
A compound sentence consists of two independent clauses that are joined together by a comma and a coordinating conjunction (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so).
1. He plays handball, but he likes basketball too.
2. Ana makes a cake and she will make a birthday party.
3. I need to study, but I am so tired.
A complex sentence is a sentence that contains an independent clause and one or more dependent clauses. An independent clause can stand alone as a sentence. A dependent clause cannot stand alone even though it has a subject and a verb.
1. She returned the vase after she realized it was broken.
2. Because my alarm was off, I didn't wake up on time.
3. Wherever you go, you can always call me.
A compound-complex sentence has at least two independent clauses and at least one dependent clause. Compound-complex sentences can help us express longer more complicated thoughts.
1. Because I studied hard, I get good grades in exams, so I can relax now.
2. When the dog barks, I know there is someone outside so I always check.
3. After the rain, we went out and we were running by the lake.
Let's try an example where one thought we can write as a simple sentence, then compound, complex and complex-compound sentence.
Simple sentence: I like to cook Italian food.
As we can see from the sentence there is a single independent clause.
Compound sentence: I like to cook Italian food and I like to eat Italian food.
There are two independent clauses, joined by a coordinating conjunction, in this case "and".
Complex sentence: I like to cook Italian food because I like to eat Italian food.
The first clause is an independent clause and the second clause is a dependent clause. "Because" is the word that makes the second clause dependent and that is why it can not stand alone.
Complex-compound sentence: I like to cook Italian food and I like to eat Italian food after I visited Italy.
The first and second clauses are independent joined with coordinating conjunction "and", and the third one is a dependent clause. The word "after" makes this clause dependent.
