Basic Sentence Patterns

To learn a language (in our case English), at the preliminary stage, it helps if we know the Basic Sentence Patterns. And if we are able to make Basic Sentences, transformation becomes easy i.e. from Affirmative (Positive) to Negative and Interrogative (Question), Active to Passive or Simple to Compound and Complex (use of more than one finite verbs).

Note – A Finite Verb has a tense and has a subject with which it agrees in number and person; e.g. sleep is finite in the sentence Babies sleep most of the time and looks is finite in the sentence The old man looks ill. But go in the sentence She wants to go is non-finite as it has no variation of tense and does not have a subject.

Most of the English Subject-and-Predicate sentences are built on the following principles. The Sentence has a framework consisting of Subject, Verb and Whatever Completer(s) – Direct Object, Indirect Object, and Complement. They come in a fixed word order. Let’s study them with the help of examples:

1. Subject + Verb(S + V) – Cats mew.
2. Subject + Verb + Complement(S + V + C) – Cats are animals.
3. Subject +Verb + Direct Object(S + V + O) – Cathy likes cats.
4. Subject + Verb + Indirect Object + Direct Object(S + V +I +O) – Cathy gives them milk.
5. Subject + Verb + Direct Object + Object Complement(S + V + O + O/C) – Milk makes them fat.

In the first sentence- Cats mew(S+V) – ‘mew’ is an intransitive verb i.e. it does not need/take a Direct Object to complete its meaning. Let us look at some more examples based on this pattern:

1. Birds fly.
2. The peacock danced.
3. Stars twinkle.
4. The sun shines.

The verbs used in these sentences are intransitive verbs as they do not take an object. But we can expand these sentences by adding an adverbial (Adv.) or prepositional phrase (PP) or a time element (TE).

1. Birds fly in the sky. (PP)
2. The peacock danced beautifully. (Adv.)
3. Stars twinkle at night. (TE)
4. The sun shines brightly. (Adv.)

Let us look at some more sentence patterns:

• Subject + Verb (be- type and become- type) + Noun

Be-type verbs – am, is, are, was, were.

Some become- type verbs – look, remain, turn, and continue.

1. I am a teacher.
2. Thomas is a doctor.
3. They are students.
4. He was a gentleman.
5. They were friends.
6. Julia became an actress.

• Subject + verb (be-type and become-type) + Adjective

Become-type verbs for this pattern – look, seem, appear, become, taste, turn, sound, smell.

1. Sheena is honest.
2. Models are pretty.
3. William appeared handsome.
4. The crowd turned nasty.

• Subject + Verb (be-type) + Adverbial

1. Ron is here.
2. They are upstairs.
3. Nobody is there.
4. The students are in the class.

• Subject + Verb (have-type) + Noun

Have-type Verbs – have, has, had, cost, resemble, etc.

1. Mr. Gibson had a red car.
2. She resembles her mother.
3. They own a beautiful bungalow.
4. Susan has a good sense of humour.

• It + Verb (be-type) + Time/Atmosphere/ Weather/Distance etc.

1. It is five O’clock.
2. It is cold.
3. It is raining.
4. It is hundred Kms. from here.