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English Grammar Lesson 1: Introduction 1.1 What is grammar? Grammar is the system of a language, by which words are formed and put together to make sentences. To put it more academically, grammar is the study of the internal structure of words (morphology 形態學) and the use of words in the construction of phrases and sentences (syntax 句法). It is not the “rules” of a language because we don’t start with grammar first, and then the language. We start with the language first, and then we figure out the grammar (the system) of that language. Languages started by people making sounds which evolved into words, phrases and sentences. And all languages change over time. So grammar as a reflection of a language at a particular time, also changes over time. (Morphology is a big word, like syntax, that tends to scare off students. What it is, the internal structure and changes of words, is of things you all are quite familiar with already. Eg. use - useless, useful, (affixes –prefix, suffix) like - dislike, likeable, depend – in-depend-ent, dependent-ly dog – dogs fish – fishes (inflection) number (singular vs. plural) time – timetable (word formation by compounding) dish – dishwasher go went gone (tenses) do did done cut cut cut Chinese (capital letter for proper nouns) 1 chinese (porcelain-small letter) I, we, you, you, he/she/it, they -- the categories of person (1st., 2nd., 3rd.) he, she, it -- gender (masculine, feminine, neuter) he’s, its, Peter’s – possessive he-him, we-us, you-you, I-me, she-her – (subjective, objective) 1.2 Do we need to study grammar to learn a language? Well, if you are a native speaker of a language, you probably don’t need to study grammar of that language. Children start to speak grammatically before they even know the word “grammar.” However, if you want to learn a foreign language well, it is easier to do so to learn some grammar of that language. 1.3 Why do we study English grammar? Open the forum and ask students their opinions. To me, I study grammar because I want to speak and write English correctly and intelligently. If that’s your reason as well, let’s begin our journey together, beginning at the most basics. 1.4 Sentence. 1.4.1 A sentence is the basic unit of communication that expresses a complete thought. 1.4.2.1 Every sentence must always include a subject 主詞 and a predicate 述語 (except for imperatives 命令語句). Or, put it in another way: 14.2.2 Every sentence must always include a subject 主詞 and a verb 動詞 (except for imperatives 命令語句). What happens after the verb depends on the type of verb—transitive or intransitive. 1.4.3 A written sentence starts with a capital letter and ends with a full stop (.), question mark (?) or exclamation mark (!). 1.4.4 The shortest sentence consists of just one word, which must be a verb. This is the imperative form, eg: “Stop!” 1.4.5 The common word order of a sentence is “subject-verb-object (SVO),” where 2 the subject is followed by the verb and then the object. eg: "Henry ate an apple." 1.4.6 The subject is one of the two main parts (subject and predicate) of a sentence; the subject is the part that is not the predicate; typically, the subject is the first noun or noun phrase in a sentence and is what the rest of the sentence "is about." eg: "The drinking water was dirty", "Julie is beautiful", "Who saw you?" 1.4.7 The predicate is the other one of the two main parts of a sentence; the predicate is the part that is not the subject, and this part usually consists of a verb with or without objects, complements, or adverbial modifiers. eg: "She is a dentist," "Who did you call?", "The girl wearing a yellow dress helped me." 1.5 The 8 Parts of Speech Sentences are composed of words, and there are thousands of them. All words serve some kind of purpose, and have different functions. For example, some words express “action,” which are called “verbs;” others name “things,” and are called “nouns.” Still other words are used to join one word to another word, and they are called “conjunctions.” These are the “building blocks” of the language. When we want to build a sentence, we use the different types of word. Each type has its own function. In English, there are 8 basic types of words. We call them the 8 parts of speech. They are: (Ask students to name the 8 parts, and write them on the board) part of speech function or “job” example words example sentences Verb action or state (to) be, have, do, like, work, sing, can, must Chu Hai College is an education institute. I like to watch movies. 3 Noun thing, place, person or idea book, dog, work, music, town, Hong Kong, teacher, John This is my dog. He lives in my house. We live in Hong Kong. Adjective describes a noun a/an, the, 69, some, good, big, red, well, interesting My dog is big. I like big dogs. Adverb describes a verb, adjective or adverb quickly, silently, well, badly, very, My dog eats quickly. When he is very really hungry, he eats really quickly. Pronoun replaces a noun I, you, he, she, some Tara is Indian. She is beautiful. Preposition links nouns to other words, and describes a relationship between the words to, at, after, on, but We went to school on Monday. Conjunction joins words or clauses or sentences and, but, when I like dogs and I like cats. I like cats and dogs. I like dogs but I don't like cats. Interjection short exclamation, sometimes inserted into a sentence oh!, ouch!, hi!, well Ouch! That hurts! Hi! How are you? Well, I don't know. 1.6. Examples of the Parts of Speech Here are some sentences made with different English parts of speech:# 4 verb noun verb Stop! John works. pronoun verb She noun verb John noun loves animals. is verb working. noun verb adjective noun Animals like kind people. noun verb noun adverb noun verb adjective noun Tara speaks English well. Tara speaks good English. pronoun verb preposition adjective noun adverb She ran to the station quickly. pron. verb adj. noun She likes big snakes conjunction pron. but I verb pron. hate them. Here is a sentence that contains every part of speech: interjection pron. conj. adj. Well, she and young noun verb John walk prep. noun adverb to school slowly. # Adapted from http://www.englishclub.com/grammar/parts-of-speech_2.htm. 5