Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[hela]

Dear teachers,

Would you please tell me if my answers are correct?

1) Identify the elements of the following sentence.

a) He (S) had decided (V) to rid himself of his aunt (Od). (?)

b) The company (S) will hire (V) all men (Od) anxious about group work (Co) by the end of the year (Ao).

c) He (S) prided (V) himself (Od) on being a methodical man (Cs?)

how do you analyse "on being"?


2) What grammatical word class do these words belong to?

You may pick up your exams after I have finished grading them.

You = subject personal pronoun
May = modal auxiliary verb
Pick = finite verb
Up = preposition
Your = possessive adjective
Exams = noun
After = adverb
I = subject personal pronoun
Have = auxiliary verb
Finished = finite verb
Grading = non-finite verb (gerund) ?
Them = object personal pronoun

Thanks a lot!
Hela

[kurt]

Identify the elements of the following sentence.

a) He (S) had decided (V) to rid himself of his aunt (Od). (?)

"to rid himself of his aunt" is the direct object; it's an infinitive phrase.

b) The company (S) will hire (V) all men (Od) anxious about group work (Co) by the end of the year (Ao).

"anxious about the group" is a reduced adjective clause.
"by the end of the year" is an adverb phrase.

c) He (S) prided (V) himself (Od) on being a methodical man (Cs?)

how do you analyse "on being"?

This sentence, in particular, is harder to "analyze." English needs to be learned in chunks, and one common chunk is the expression is "pride [himself/herself/themselves, etc] on"

However, you can think of "on being a methodical man" as a prepositional adverb phrase describing the verb "prided." What did he pride himself on? Or, what did he take pride in? -- being a methodical man


2) What grammatical word class do these words belong to?

You may pick up your exams after I have finished grading them.

You = subject personal pronoun
May = modal auxiliary verb
Pick up = phrasal verb (finite)
Your = possessive adjective
Exams = noun
After = adverb
I = subject personal pronoun
Have = auxiliary verb
Finished = finite verb

I think you're overanalyzing grammar. It's better to see "have finished" as a chunk of words that represent the present perfect verb tense than trying to break each individual word into labels.

Grading = gerund
Them = object personal pronoun

Kurt

http://www.kurtweissgerber.com