Eighth Snippet from >Fundamentals of an Excellent Liberal Arts Education >>>>> English Usage >>>>> Parts of Speech

Note to readers  >>>>>


So terrible is the education that our children receive in the Minneapolis Public Schools that I am writing a book to deliver the education that they should receive, moving through this book with my own students and offering it to others who want their children to receive an excellent, knowledge-intensive K-12 education.


I have found that in training my students for the ACT and in reading many kinds of literature, they have no sense at all of English usage---  because this important aspect of an excellent K-12 education gets short shrift, if indeed it gets any attention at all.


You may scroll down my blog for seven other snippets from my new book.


What follows is a snippet from Chapter Nine:  English Usage, from this new book, my Fundamentals of an Excellent Liberal Arts Education:




Fundamentals of English Usage  >>>>>>   Parts of Speech


Nouns


Definitiion >>>>> Words for persons, places, things, and conditions.


Two Types


1. Common nouns >>>>> names for general categories of items, without additional specificity or branding


Examples >>>>> apple, girl, car, restaurant, cereal Note: Nouns that identify conditions include the following: caution , marriage, residency, fate, and intelligence


2. Proper Nouns >>>>>> names for specific people and items, as in the names of people and brands


Examples >>>>> Red Delicious Apples, Angelic (Angelique), Honda, Raisin Bran, Target




Pronouns

Definition >>>>> words that take the place of a nouns in a sentences.


Three Types >>>>>


1. Subject pronouns >>>>> Pronouns that occupy the place of a subject in a sentence


Examples >>>>> He, she, we, they, you, it


Example sentences >>>>> 


1) He seems to have decided to go fishing today.


2) She said that she would be here in an hour.


3) We are thinking of going to Mexico this summer.


4) They ran the best race of their lives.


5) You may come with us if you’d like to see the new library.


6) It came and went before I could identify it clearly.




2. Object pronouns >>>>> Pronouns that occupy the place of an object in a sentence


Examples >>>>> Him, her, us, them, you, it


Example sentences >>>>>


7) I’d like to go fishing with him today.


8) Please get this to her as soon as possible.


9) She ran with us all of the way from my house to the park.


10) She showed a lot of respect for them in her choice of words.


11) They were so happy when they found it.




3. Possessive pronouns >>>>> Pronouns that signify items belonging to someone.


Examples >>>>> His, her, our, their, your, its


Example sentences


12) His mother is so nice.


13) Do you have any idea if this is her backpack?


14) I hope that you’ll go with our family to Mexico this summer.


15) Their pride was obvious when she told them about her acceptance to the university.     


16) Your essay was the best in the class.


17) Please put everything in its proper place.




Verbs


Two ways of classifying verbs >>>>> 


1) Action versus State of Being


Action Verbs are verbs such as run, drive, climb, talk, and maneuver that convey motion and activity.


State of Being Verbs that link the subject of a sentence to the predicate but do not convey motion or activity; such verbs include is, are, were, was, and become.


Note: There is a special kind of adjective called a predicate nominative that follows a state of being verb in constructions such as the following:


You are kind to say so. Natasha is generous in every way.


2) Transitive versus Intransitive >>>>>


Transitive Verbs take direct objects as with the following:


She wound up and threw the ball. ("Ball" is the direct object)


Intransitive Verbs do not take direct objects, but rather appear as follows:


Water evaporates quickly in the desert.




Adjectives describe nouns, as in the following examples: delicious meal; brilliant analysis; exquisite gem; huge boulder; slow walk


Adverbs  describe verbs and other adverbs, as in the following examples: quickly ran; softly sings; heavily breathe; very artfully; extremely carefully


Prepositions convey a sense of where something is positioned and include words such as in, out, under, over, through, from, to, and with


Articles are typically short words that precede nouns such as in the following examples: A book; an apple; the cpmputer; this plate; that car; those people




Note: The article, "an" appears before vowels, whereas the article,"a," appears before consonants.