Part of Speech

Definition

Examples

adjective

 

Describes a noun

hairy, crazy, wonderful

adverb

Describes a verb, adjective or another adverb (it often ends with “ly”)

carefully, easily, barely, several, soon, today

articles

Are adjectives, little words that precede nouns

a, an, the

 

conjunctions

join together words, phrases, or clauses

and, or, but, yet, so, for

 

direct objects

Is the receiver of action within a sentence, as in

She hit the ball, or

They named their daughter Ann.

helping verbs

Are used to form some of the verb tenses of the main verb

is, was, had, should, will,

Tom was washing his dog.

homophones/homonyms

 

Words that sound the same but have different meanings

Whale/wail, weighed, wade, tail/tale, pair/pear

interjection

Is an outcry or sudden utterance and usually starts a sentence

Wow, gosh, darn

noun

A person, place, thing, or idea

Pencil, girl, supermarket, happiness

object of the preposition

 

Is the noun that follows the preposition

Over the fence

parallel structure

Means using the same pattern of words to show that two or more ideas have the same level of importance

Mary likes swimming, hiking, and bicycling.

participles

A verb forms that usually end in ing or ed

Participles function as adjectives but have characteristics of verbs

Swimming, hiked

predicate

Contains the verb of the sentence and says what the subject is doing

Sally is eating pizza for dinner.

pronoun

Replaces a noun or noun phrase

He, she, it, they

preposition

(simple, compound, phrasal)

Describes the relationship between a noun and another noun (or verb or adverb)

to, under, for, at, by, from

simple: at, in, on

compound: outside, underneath

phrasal: on account of, in front of

prepositional phrase

Is a phrase that describes the relationship between a noun and another noun (or verb or adverb)

To the store, under the rug, for their friends.

subject

Is the “who” or “what” that a sentence is about

A writer can be creative.

verb

Are the actions or existence words that tell what nouns do

Run, are, jump

verbs of being

Verbs that do not have action

Was, were, are, is

 

verb tenses

 

 

 

 

 

Tense indicates time, there

present, past, future

Am, was, will be

present- action happening at the present time

present perfect – action that began in the past but continues in the present

The students sit in their seats.


The students have sat in their seats.

past – action that is completed

past perfect – action in that past that occurs before another past action

The students sat in their seats.

The students had sat in their seats all day.

 

future – action that will take place in the future

future perfect – action that will begin in the future and be completed by a specific time in the future

The students will sit in their seats.


The students will have sat in their seats all day.