Grammar: Clauses
A clause is a group of words that express a single idea. Clauses are the building blocks of sentences. A sentence can contain one or more clauses. Clauses contain at the very least a subject and a verb.
- Subject
- The subject is the person, place, thing, or idea that is doing something
- Verb
In a clause, somebody (subject) is doing (verb) something.
Examples
- I like pies
- John was late.
- Subject - John
- Verb - was
There are two kinds of clauses:
- Independent clauses - they can stand alone as complete sentences
- The teacher was not there
- John's assignment was late
- Dependent clauses - they need an independent clause to make sense
- When we arrived in class
- he lost marks
- If clauses need to be joined together, then use punctuation or conjunctions
- When we arrived in class, the teacher was not there
- John's assignment was late so he lost marks
