verbs

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Revision

Come up with some adjectives ending in: -ish, -ful, -y, -ive, -able.

Give the comparative and superlative forms of the following adjectives: thin, far, homeless, friendly, terrible.

Analyze the following adjectives: circular, brownish, clever, Chinese, slow.

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Verbs

March 30, 2012















VerbsA verb is a word used primarily to indicate a type of action (fly,

walk, throw), though sometimes the action is merely emotional or intellectual (believe, think). It may also be used to indicate a state of being (live, exist).

The term ‘verb’ is from the Latin ‘verbum’ meaning ‘word’: hence it is the word of a sentence. A thought cannot be expressed without a verb. When the child cries, "Apple!" it means, “Look, an apple!” or “I have an apple!” or “I want an apple.”

Depending on the language, a verb may vary in form according to many factors, possibly including its tense, mood and voice. It may also agree with the person and number.















Transitive vs Intransitive

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1FL05uW4Fg All action verbs are divided into transitive and intransitive verbs. To determine whether a verb is transitive, ask whether the action is

done to someone or something. Or put another way, does someone or something receive the action of the verb. If it does, then the verb is transitive and the person or thing that receives its action is the direct object.

E.g. Becky walked the dog. – ‘walk’ is a transitive verb here.But the word ‘walk’ can also be intransitive. E.g. Becky walked to

school. There is no object following the verb in this example. An intransitive verb never has a direct or indirect object. E.g. He

lives in Haapsalu.















Linking Verbs

A linking verb connects the subject of a sentence to a noun or adjective that renames or describes it. This noun or adjective is called the subject complement.

E.g. Jason became a businessman. – The verb ‘became’ links the subject to its complement.

The most common linking verb is the verb BE in all of its forms (am, is, are, was, were, etc.). But it may also be used as a helping verb (see next slide). Other common linking verbs are: become, seem. Some verbs may be linking verbs in some cases and action verbs in other cases, e.g., to feel, to smell, to taste, to appear, to look, to turn, etc.















Helping Verbs

Once upon a time there was a wealthy merchant named Mr. Do. Mr. Do was very old and very rich. His many relatives were dreaming of the day the old man would die. They wondered which one of them would inherit his money. Finally, one day Mr. Do died. All the relatives searched his house for a will. They didn't find one. They searched his house three times. They still did not find a will. The relatives did not get one dime of Mr. Do's fortune.

The moral of the story: Maybe Mr. Do should have a will. Remember this sentence and you will know how to set up a chart of

the 23 helping verbs! The largest "family" is the "BE" family with 8 members. The other five families have 3 members each.















Helping Verbs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-bIkB52GdI May be do should have willMight being does could has canMust been did would had shall

amisarewaswere

A sentence may contain up to three helping verbs to the main verb. E.g., The dog must have been chasing the cat.















Helping Verbs

Helping words are also called auxiliary verbs. They come before the main verb of a sentence and convey additional information regarding aspects of possibility (can, could, etc.) or time (was, did, has, etc.). Together with the main verb they form a verb phrase.

Auxiliaries can be used before the word ‘not’, main verbs cannot. The contracted form ‘n’t’ can also be attached to almost all auxiliaries; this is not possible with main verbs (apart from ‘be’ and ‘have’)

A modal verb is a type of auxiliary verb that is used to indicate modality (i.e. possibility, necessity), e.g., can, shall, will, must, may.















Verbs

Put the following words into three groups: simple, derived, compound verbs:

To classify, to jump, to babysit, to organize, to undergo, to swim, to dream, to sleepwalk, to soften, to activate, to wink, to blackmail, to simplify















Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verbs are "multi-word verbs“, e.g., pick up, turn on or get on with. These verbs consist of a basic verb + another word or words. The other word(s) can be prepositions and/or adverbs. The two or three words that make up multi-word verbs form a short "phrase“ — which is why these verbs are often called "phrasal verbs".

http://my.englishclub.com/video/amazing-intro-to-phrasal-verbs The important thing to remember is that a multi-word verb is still a

verb. "Get" is a verb. "Get up", is also a verb. "Get" and "get up" are two different verbs.















Regular vs IrregularThe forms of regular verbs can be predicted by rules. There are thousands

of regular verbs in English. Regular verbs appear in 4 forms: the base form (a form with no endings,

as listed in a dictionary), the –s form (used for the 3rd person singular in the present tense), the –ing form (present participle), the –ed form (in the past form and -ed participle form).

An irregular verb is one where some of the forms are unpredictable. There are more than 400 irregular verbs in English. Irregular forms make their –s form and –ing form by adding an ending to the base, in the same way as regular verbs do. But they have either an unpredictable past tense or an unpredictable –ed participle form or both. Many irregular verbs therefore appear in 5 forms. E.g. sing, sings, singing, sang, sung

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWSESCNvf4k















Tense

A tense is a form of a verb used to indicate the time, and sometimes the continuation or completeness, of an action in relation to the time of speaking. (From Latin tempus = ‘time’).

So, we talk about time in English with tenses. But:• we can also talk about time without using tenses (for

example, going to is a special construction to talk about the future, it is not a tense)

• one tense does not always talk about one time (If I had time, I would go.)















The English Verb Tense System

Present Simple Past Simple Future SimplePresent Continuous Past ContinuousFuture ContinuousPresent Perfect Past Perfect Future PerfectPresent P. Continuous Past P. Continuous Future P. Continuous+Future Simple in the pastFuture Continuous in the pastFuture Perfect in the pastFuture Perfect Continuous in the past

16 tenses in Active Voice10 tenses in Passive Voice















Mood

1) Indicative mood expresses a simple statement or fact, which can be positive (affirmative) or negative.e.g. I like coffee. I don’t like coffee.

2) Imperative mood expresses a commande.g. Sit down! Don´t leave!

3) Subjunctive mood expresses what is imagined or wished or possiblee.g. The President ordered that he attend the meeting. I demand that he be here. I wish that he were with me.Today the mood has practically vanished. Instead the conditional mood is used (might, could, would clauses).

Some linguists consider interrogative sentences to constitute a mood as well - interrogative mood.e.g. Why do you like coffee? What´s wrong with you?















Voicehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKUNYp_Bc0g A voice shows the relationship of the subject to the action. In the

active voice, the subject does the action (cats eat mice). In the passive voice, the subject receives the action (mice are eaten by cats). Among other things, we can use voice to help us change the focus of attention.E.g., He has broken the window.The window has been broken.

Most verbs which take an object (transitive verbs) can appear in both active and passive constructions (eat, break, buy). There are just a few exceptions, such as resemble and most uses of have (e.g. I had a car.).















Bibliography

Crystal, D. (2003). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. CUP

Understanding Verbs: Basic Types of Verbswww.uhv.edu/ac/efl/pdf/verbsbasictypes.pdfUnderstanding Verbs: Verb Tenseswww.uhv.edu/ac/efl/pdf/verbstenses.pdfThe English Verb Tense Systemwww.bergen.edu/faculty/rfreud/verbtense.pdf














http://www.uhv.edu/ac/efl/pdf/verbsbasictypes.pdf

http://www.uhv.edu/ac/efl/pdf/verbstenses.pdf

http://www.bergen.edu/faculty/rfreud/verbtense.pdf

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