Having a mindful mind will enhance your life in a lot of ways. And here’s the first chapter entirely for free!
Chapter 1: Word Order The first words in a sentence are usually the PERSON, PLACE, or THING that the sentence is about.
Some examples include: -John -I -The cat -The building
These are often called NOUNS and PRONOUNS.
The next thing in a sentence is usually the VERB which is usually the thing the SUBJECT is doing.
Some examples include: -ran -said -pooped -is That last one might be odd to you. The person is “is-ing.” It’s like “existing.”
Take this sentence for example: -“He is.” There are fancy terms around this area, but I don’t deal in fancy words. I’m a writer, not a teacher. Anyway, if you don’t understand what I’m going on about with “is,” just remember that “existing” words like that, such as WAS, ARE, and AM are all verbs. That means so far we have a SUBJECT + VERB. THING + ACTION.
Next, we have what the VERB is affecting. The VERB is doing a thing and it’s doing it to what–the next part of the sentence.
Examples include: -The road -Everything -Their Mountain Bikes -Her You might be wondering why these look an awful lot like NOUNS and PRONOUNS. And they are.
Your pool of options when choosing a SUBJECT, and your pool of options when choosing an OBJECT are very similar. And that’s what this part of the sentence is called: OBJECT. The VERB does its thing to the OBJECT. It’s the OBJECT because the VERB did its thing to it.
All together, we have this, and I’ll give you three versions of the same thing: Version 1: SUBJECT + VERB + OBJECT. Version 2: THING + ACTION + THING. Version 3: PERSON, PLACE, OR THING + ACTION WORD + THING BEING ACTED UPON
Now, let’s talk about our mortal enemy: the exception. If your goal is to be able to name which part of the sentence is a SUBJECT, VERB, or OBJECT, then this is important for you.
Backwards!
What if instead of: -The horse kicked the bucket. You have: -The bucket was kicked by the horse. These both have THING + ACTION + THING, but one has SUBJECT + VERB + OBJECT, while the other has OBJECT + VERB + SUBJECT.
One is backwards! The way to figure out which is which is to look at who’s doing what. The SUBJECT is the one doing the thing, the one doing the kicking. The OBJECT is the one something is being done to, the one being kicked. Therefore, the horse is the subject, and the bucket is the object. It’s generally bad writing to do something like the second example, so hopefully you’ll see mostly the first.
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