Grammar of Scary Stories

Parts of speech

Why study Grammar?• Grammar, in the English Language, is

used to help us break down and understand the way we use the language.

• When we are writing, we try to build something – a character, setting, atmosphere etc.. Adverbs, adjectives and verbs are used to describe an object or an action. They are used to give life to what we are describing.

Nouns• A noun is a word used to name a person,

place or thing.

• For example,

Girl, home, ball, tower, golf, hat, legs, grass

There are different types of nouns

1. Common Noun:

• A common noun is used to name ordinary things.

• For example,

People: child, doctor, gardener

Places: backyard, school, park

Things: stick, dog, seat, kitchen

2. Proper Nouns

• Proper Noun: is used to name a particular person, place or thing. It always begins with a capital letter.

• For example,

People: Anna, Brodie, Chelsea

Places: Canberra, Perth, Toyko

Things: January, the Big Banana, Tuesday

3. Collective Nouns

• Collective Nouns: is one word used to name a group of things or animals.

• For example,Anthology of stories,Bunch of flowers,Choir of singersFlock of birds, Litter of pups, Troop of monkeys, Vineyard of grapes.

Abstract Noun

• Abstract Noun: is a word used to name a quality, feeling or condition. It is something that can not be seen, heard or touched.

• For example,

Love, happiness, fear anger, fun, empathy, apathy, safety, excitement.

Find the nouns:

1. Write down all the nouns in the following passage.

2. What type of nouns are they? Collective, Common, Abstract, or Proper.

“Sue silently stepped onto the wooden porch of the dilapidated house. She froze, hearing a floorboard creak under her weight.”

Answers

• Sue silently stepped onto the wooden porch of the dilapidated house. She froze, hearing a floorboard creak under her weight.

• Sue – Proper Noun• Porch – Common Noun• House – Common Noun• Floorboard – Common Noun• Weight – Abstract Noun

Adjective

• Adjectives are words that describe nouns. Adjectives tell you what somebody or something is like.

• For example,

angry, brave, healthy, handsome, little, tall red, Australian.

Adjective activity

Find the adjectives in the passages below:

• “Sue silently walked through the old, wooden doorway into the dilapidated crumbling house.”

• “The rusty door hinges groaned loudly from lack of use.”

Answers

1. “Sue silently walked through the old, wooden doorway into the dilapidated crumbling house.”

2. “The rusty door hinges groaned loudly from lack of use.”

Pronouns

• A pronoun is a word used in place of a noun. A pronoun does the same job as a noun. There are different types of pronouns.

• A pronoun is used only after a noun has been used in a sentence.

• For Example,The dog was running very quickly. He had

just stolen the sausages.

Personal Pronoun

• is used to refer to you, me, other people and things.

• For example,

I Me You

He Him She

Her It We

Us They then

Possessive pronoun:

• is used to show possession. A possessive pronoun never uses an apostrophe.

• For example,

Mine Yours His

Hers Its Ours

Yours Theirs Whose

Indefinite pronoun

• is an ‘unlimited’ pronoun. Unlimited because it could refer to a number of persons/objects.

• For example,

Somebody Anybody Nobody

Everybody Someone No-one

Everyone Anything Nothing

Something Everything

Anyone

Verbs

• Verbs are ‘doing’, ‘being or ‘having’ words. They describe some form of action – they tell you what is happening.

• For example,

Agree, be, go, jump, sing, laughed, listen, walking

Action verb

• An action verb express an action you can see

• For example,

I love eating chocolate.

My sister always laughs at my jokes.

Saying Verb

• Saying verb express a spoken action.

• For example,

I was talking to the bus driver.

The man shouted out.

The lady whispered in the movies.

Having or Being verbs

• Having or Being verbs describe what things are or what they have.

• For example,

Peter has a bike.

The Koala is cute.

You are beautiful.

Sue was here.

Verb Activity

• Find the verbs in the following passage:

“Sue silently stepped onto the wooden porch of the dilapidated house. She froze, hearing a floorboard creak under her weight. Determined, she took a deep breath and forced herself to push open the door.”

Verb Activity Answers

• Find the verbs in the following passage:

“Sue silently stepped onto the wooden porch of the dilapidated house. She froze, hearing a floorboard creak under her weight. Determined, she took a deep breath and forced herself to push open the door.”

Helping Verbs

• A helping verb is often used with other verbs. Helping verbs help the verb build more meaning. There are 23 helping verbs – they are:

For example,• My Brother has been talking

on the phone for hours.• My Mum was smiling at my

Dad.• The puppy has been barking

all day.• The baby was crying all night.

May Might Must

Be Being Been

Am Are Is

Was Were Do

Does Did Should

Could Would Have

Had Has Will

Can Shall

Tense

• Verbs also show ‘tense’. Tense indicates the time of the action.

Present Tense: The action is happening right now. Shown by –ing on the verb.

• For example,

The baby is crying.

The puppy is barking.

Past Tense

• Past tense: The action has already happened. Shown with –ed on the verb.

For example,

• The baby cried all night.

• The puppy barked all day.

Future Tense

• Future Tense: The action will happen in the future. Shown by the helping verb ‘will’.

For example,

• The baby will cry.

• The puppy will bark all day.

Tense Examples

1. “Bob and Joe will walk slowly down the road.”

This is future tense. This is evident by the word ‘will’, meaning it has not yet happened.

Tense Examples

2. “Bob and Joe were walking down the road.” -

This is present tense. This is shown by the ‘ing’ at the end of “walk”. This shows us that they are currently doing the action – they are “walking”.

Tense Examples

3. “Bob and Joe slowly walked down the road.”

This is past tense. We know this because of the ‘ed’ at the end of walk. This means that they ‘have already’ walked down the road.

Tense Activity

• Work out which tense is being used: Past, Present or Future.

1. Belinda has a cold.2. I will jog past the park.3. I am eating McDonald’s with my friend

Mel.4. All I could hear was my Mother yelling at

me.5. The rain will pour down.

Tense Activity

• Work out which tense is being used: Past, Present or Future.

1. Belinda has a cold. - Present.2. I will jog past the park. – Future.3. I am eating McDonald’s with my friend

Mel. – Present.4. All I could hear was my Mother yelling at

me. – Present.5. The rain will pour down. – Future.

Noun – Verb agreement

• One of the most important things to remember is the noun-verb agreement. This is when we consider the singular or plural nature of the nouns in the sentence.

• If we use a singular noun, then we use a singular verb.

• If we use a plural noun, then we use a plural verb.For example,• The child is happy.• The children are happy.• The farmer was planting seeds.• The farmers were planting seeds.

Adverb

• Adverbs give meaning to verbs. They describe what, where or how.

For example,

When: soon, already, never,

Where: above, downstairs, in

How: softly, happily, kindly

Adverbs Activity

• Find the adverbs in the following passage:

“The rusty door hinges groaned loudly from lack of use. Dirty cobwebs were everywhere. Inside her chest, Sue’s heart began to beat furiously. Her body shook uncontrollably.”

Adverbs Activity Answers

• Find the adverbs in the following passage:

“The rusty door hinges groaned loudly from lack of use. Dirty cobwebs were everywhere. Inside her chest, Sue’s heart began to beat furiously. Her body shook uncontrollably.”

Conjunction

• Conjunctions are joining words. They are used to connect words or sentences together.

For Example,

Although, and, because, but, however, if, or,

Conjunction Activity

• Join two or more of the following sentences using a conjunction.

a. She walked quickly.b. The night was dark and menacing.c. The tall gates looked scary.d. The door hinges groaned as they opened.e. He was terrified.f. She froze.g. Footsteps could be heard downstairs.

Conjunction Activity Answers

a. She walked quickly.b. The night was dark and menacing.c. The tall gates looked scary.d. The door hinges groaned as they

opened.e. He was terrified.f. She froze.g. Footsteps could be heard downstairs.

Interjection

• Interjections are interruptions or words used to express strong feelings.

For example,

Aha!, Oh!, eh?, Great!, oops!, ouch!, ahhh!

Punctuation

• Is used to add emphasis to our descriptions. Where we place our punctuation marks is very important.

• Not the following example,

Look at the punctuation:

Sue silently stepped onto the wooden porch of the dilapidated house. She froze, hearing a floorboard creak under her weight. Determined, she took a deep breath and forced herself to push open the door. The rusty door hinges groaned from the lack of use. Cobwebs were everywhere. Inside her chest, Sue’s heart began to beat furiously. Bump-Bump. Bump-Bump. He body shook. She began to sweat. She was terrified!

Summary

We have looked at:1. Nouns – common, collective, abstract.2. Adjectives.3. Pronouns4. Verbs – Action, Saying, Having or Being. Helping

verbs.5. Tense6. Noun - Verb agreement.7. Adverbs8. Conjunctions9. Interjections10. Punctuation