Simple grammar cheat sheet
Grammar
Syntax
Parts of Speech
- categories for the role of a word in a sentence
- such as adjective, adverb, noun, verb, etc.
- many words can operate across or as different parts of speech
- ex., an "attributive noun" acts as an adjective that modifies another noun ("dog food")
| Part of Speech | Definition | Category | Other |
|---|---|---|---|
| Adjective | modifies nouns | modifier | |
| Adverb | modifies verbs and adjectives | modifier | |
| Article | identifies a known or unknown noun
("the" or "a"/"an") |
modifier | |
| Conjunction | joins or contrasts words and sentence parts | grammatical | |
| Determiner | identifies specificity (these), quantity (five), amount (some), possession (our), sufficiency (enough) or a noun | modifier | |
| Interjection | an exclamation or abrupt remark (What?, Yes!) | grammatical | |
| Noun | a person, place or thing | grammatical | |
| Preposition | identifies a relationship between a noun or a verb and another noun ("on the table", "to the store") | modifier | |
| Pronoun | references a noun or a person (I, you, he/she/it, we, they, etc.) | grammatical | |
| Verb | indicates action or existence | grammatical |
Modifier
- a word or set of words that "modify" or change, add to, qualify, or describe another word or another part of a sentence
- some parts of speech are modifiers:
- adjective, adverb, article, determiner, preposition
- phrases and clauses can also act as modifiers
Sentence Parts
Subject
- a noun
- the actor
- i.e., the person place or thing that does the action
- in grammar, "subject" is in the sense of "to subject" or "to force into submission"
- as in the "doer" of the sentence, the actor that causes the action
- also related to the word "subjective," which means "from the perspective of"
Verb
- word that expresses an action ("make") or existence ("be")
- infinitive = "to" + the verb , as in "to make"
- infinitives express the action in general but not the action itself
- infinitives can operate as nouns or adjectives
- as in "I want to go" ("to go" = the object of the verb "want")
Predicate
- expresses what happens to the subject
- i.e., = the verb + the result or outcome of an action
Object
- the recipient of the action
- i.e.,
- direct object
- indirect object
Sentence
- a grammatically complete thought
- contains a subject & verb/predicate
Clause
- part of a sentence
- has a subject & verb
Independent clause
Phrase
- two or more words that
- do not contain a subject & verb
- form a distinct grammatical unit ("constituent")