Understanding Nouns, Pronouns, and Verbs in Language

1. Parts of speech 1 Week 6

2. Nouns—persons, places, thing, & ideas • Abstract Nouns—ideas • Fear • Cleverness • Misery • Civilization • Honor • Concrete Nouns—persons, places, and things that can be seen, heard, smelled, tasted, or touched • Trumpet • Street • Tortilla • Golden Gate Bridge

3. Nouns • Common Nouns • General persons, places, or things • Do not capitalize • city • turnpike • war • Proper Nouns • particular persons, places, or things • Always capitalize • Sometimes more than one word (like in a title) • Sioux Falls • New Jersey Turnpike • the Civil War

4. nouns • Collective Nouns—name a group of people, animals, or things • squad • class • flock • association • Compound Nouns—consist of 2 or more words, sometimes hyphenated, sometimes written as one word, and sometimes written as 2 words • great-aunt • one-fourth • horseradish • postal worker • junior high school

5. nouns • Noun Phrase—noun and its modifiers • The young girl • Several children • The yellow tulip • Sweet as chocolate • Writing Hint: Nouns can signal possession. When you’re working with plural nouns, add either an apostrophe or ‘s, depending on the last letter of the plural nouns. If the last letter is –s, use just an apostrophe; if the last letter is not –s, use ‘s. • Winners’ blue uniforms • The Kennedys' fame • The children’s shrieks • The mice’s cheese

6. In-class assignment • With a partner, improve the weak paragraph in Exercise 6.1by replacing the italicized words with specific nouns or noun phrases.

7. Pronouns • words that take the place of nouns or other pronouns • Usually refer to something previously mentioned, called an antecedent • Identify the pronouns in the sentence below: • Inez and her friend are newspaper staff members. They go to an editorial meeting each Tuesday. It is held in Mr. Chavez’s office. • What are the antecedents for each pronoun?

8. Pronouns • Personal Pronouns, and their possessive forms, are most common • She was the first to arrive because her train was early • Indefinite Pronouns express an amount or refer to an unspecified person or thing • Many came despite the rain, and few were disappointed • Demonstrative Pronouns point to specific people or things • This is the reserved section; those over there are available

9. Pronouns • Relative Pronouns introduce some subordinate clauses • Suki, who lives farthest from the school, has never been absent. • Interrogative Pronouns are used in questions • To whom are you speaking? What did you say? • Reciprocal Pronouns express mutual action or relation • Teammates rely on one another for support during a game.

10. Pronouns • Reflexive and Intensive Pronouns end in –self and –selves • Reflexive Pronouns refer to an earlier noun or pronoun • I love myself. • Intensive Pronouns add emphasis • The principal herself taught the class.

11. In-class assignment • With a partner, underline all the pronouns in Exercise 6.2, including possessive pronouns. • Challenge: After you identify the pronouns, label each pronoun with the appropriate type of pronoun (personal, indefinite, demonstrative, relative, interrogative, reflexive, intensive, or reciprocal).

12. Verbs—express an action or state of being • Action Verbs communicate an observable action • Describe what people do or what people feel • Frank Lloyd Wright designed and built homes and other structures. His clients admired his style. • Verbs take a variety of forms to communicate time • The hiker shivers. The hiker shivered. The hiker was shivering. • Linking Verbs link the subject of a sentence with a word that tells more about it • The surgeon appeared confident. The surgeon is an innovator. But wait! It isn’t always that simple.  • Some words can be action verbs in one context and linking verbs in another. • If a form of becan substitute for the verb, the verb is functioning as a linking verb • The performer looked nervously at the audience. (Action) • The performer looked nervous. (Linking)

13. verbs • Verb Phrases are verbs preceded by one or more helping (auxiliary) verbs • Hasn’t anyone here seen the remote? I have been looking for it for an hour. • Not (or in its contraction form, n’t) is never part of the verb phrase • NOTE: Beware of verbals, which look like verbs but function as a noun, adjective, or adverb • People enjoying the play. (sentence fragment because enjoying describes the people) • People enjoyed the play. (complete sentence because enjoyed describes what the people did)

14. In-class assignment Identify every verb and verb phrase in the sentences below: • Anyone can create music with the natural instrument we call the voice. • As musical expression developed, people joined voice groups. • Gregorian chant, or plainsong, which arose in the early Middle Ages, was one early form of choral performance. • In chant, all participants sing or hum one melody in unison; the technical term for this is monophony. • In the late Middle Ages, composers experimented and gave different voices different musical lines within the same piece of music. • Soon, variations in rhythm and harmony led to the diverse polyphonic music we are familiar with today.

15. Adjectives • Modifiers that give information about the nouns and pronouns they modify • What kind? • Red flower, straight road, high-altitude climb, surprise visit • How many? • Four days, few entries • How much? • More space, some effort • Which one? • Third response, that shirt, worst joke, last month

16. Adjectives • Writers sometimes use more than one adjective to modify a single noun. • Example: The long, steep, strenuous climb back to the rim loomed before them. • A and an are adjectives but are also called indefinite articles. They refer to any one member of a group and so are indefinite. Similarly, the is an adjective but is called the definite articlebecause it points out a particular noun. • Proper adjectives are derived from proper nouns. They always begin with a capital letter. • Japanese food • Confederate troops • Jackson democracy

17. Adjectives • Predicate adjectives are adjectives that come after the word they modify. • The smoked salmon tastes salty. • The manager is stern but fair. • Sometimes, when a noun or a possessive pronoun modifies another noun, it is called an adjective. • Motel room • Mother’s pie • Corn pudding • School auditorium

18. Adverbs • Like adjectives, adverb add clarity to sentences • Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs • They answer when, where,and how questions. • Intensifiers are adverbs that answer the question to what extent or how much • When? • Today, we began rehearsals for the play. • Where? • They walked here from the station. • How? • The actor spoke clearly and loudly. • To what extent? • We thoroughly enjoyed the performance.

19. Adverbs • Many adverbs, sometimes called adverbs of manner, end with the suffix –ly. • Adverbs can modify prepositions and prepositional phrases. • They arrived here justafter dinner. • Her hand reached almostto the top. • Adverbs can modify subordinate clauses and complete sentences. • I’ll play the tape again onlyif you want me to. • Surely, he didn’t mean to put the car in reverse. • Many negatives—for example, not, n’t, barely, and never—are adverbs; they can interrupt parts of a verb phrase. • He should not have moved backward.

20. Week 6 quiz • Pick up and begin your quiz at the bell.