Download Subject and Predicate

Grammar
Name
Date
The Sentence
Now that we have completed our preliminary study of verbs, nouns, and pronouns, we will take
a brief detour away from the parts of speech to the sentence.
A sentence is a group of words expressing a complete thought.
Sentences also have two other characteristics: they begin with a capital letter and end with some kind of
end mark, and they always contain a subject and a predicate.
The Subject
The subject of a sentence is almost always a noun or a pronoun, and as Warriner’s (the old grammar
textbook you are fortunate enough not to have) puts it, “The subject of a sentence is the part about which
something is being said.” Another way to think about the subject is that it is the purpose of the sentence. The
sentence was written in order to say something about the subject. The simple subject of a sentence
contains only the main noun or pronoun. It is usually one word only, though it can be more than one
word in the case of proper nouns and collective nouns. The complete subject of a sentence contains the
main noun or pronoun and any modifiers, including adjectives, prepositional phrases, and so on.
The Predicate
The predicate of a sentence, says Warriner’s, “is the part which says something about the subject.”
The predicate can be defined as everything else in the sentence that isn’t the subject. The simple predicate
consists of the main verb (action or linking verb) and any helping verbs. Or you might say the simple
predicate contains the verb or verb phrase. The complete predicate contains the verb and any helping
verbs, adverbs that modify the verb (phrase), prepositional phrases, and other parts of the sentence that
you will soon learn, such as the direct object, the indirect object, and their modifiers.
Finding the Subject and Predicate
Knowing what a subject and predicate are is one thing; finding them is another. To find the subject
and predicate of a sentence, follow the steps below.
1.
Read the sentence through once carefully in order to get its meaning.
2.
First you should find the predicate, which means locate the verb and any helping verbs. The verb will
either be a word expressing some kind of mental or physical action, or it will be one of the nineteen
linking verbs you had to memorize, including all of the forms of the verb to be. When you find these
items, you will have found the simple predicate.
3.
Next you must find the subject. Ask yourself, “Who or what is doing or performing the verb?” Or
simply, “Who or what
(insert verb)?” For example, in the sentence, “The lion
sleeps tonight,” you would find the verb sleeps and then ask yourself, “Who or what sleeps?” The
answer, of course, would be lion. Therefore, lion is your simple subject. In a sentence that contains a
linking verb, the process is the same. For example, take the sentence, “The sun is a glowing ball of
incandescent gas.” You would first find the verb is, and then ask yourself “Who or what is?” The
answer would be sun.
Let’s see if we can discover the simple subjects and predicates of the following sentences: 1. The trashcan is
empty. 2. My knee aches. 3. We are having enchiladas for dinner.
4. Last summer I went to the beach
frequently.
5. Don’t forget your backpack. 
6. The car sped around the corner.