STANDARD 1.1   English Language Conventions w Level K

SENTENCES / COMPLETE SUBJECTS

A sentence is a group of words that expresses a complete thought.  However, in order to express a complete thought, a sentence must have something called a subject. The subject lets you know what a sentence is about.

The easiest way to find the subject in a sentence is to look for the person or the thing that is doing something.

For example, look at this sentence: Anthony is walking to school.

In this sentence, Anthony is the one who is doing something. He is walking. Therefore, Anthony is the subject of the sentence.

However, a complete subject is all of the words that tell what the sentence is about. In other words, a complete subject is all of the words that tell you who are what is doing something in the sentence.

Lets looked at another example...

Consider the sentence: My older brother, Anthony, is walking to school today.

Once again, Anthony is the one who is doing something -- walking. However, if I want to give all of the words that tell who is doing the walking, I have to say, "My older brother, Anthony."

Do you see that? Anthony is just the simple subject. If I want to say who is doing the walking -- including all of the details -- I have to say the whole phrase: "My older brother, Anthony," which is the complete subject.

RECAP:

• A sentence is a group of words that expresses a complete thought.
  

• To express a complete thought a sentence must have a complete subject.
  

• The complete subject is all of the words that tell what the sentence is about.
  

Copyright © 2006 by Fred Duckworth

Objective: Students will recognize and use complete, coherent sentences.

ENGLISH GRAMMAR